


Hobbit Advent Prompt Fills

by madame_faust



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Baby Dwarves, Bearded Dwarf Women, Disabled Character, Dwarf Culture & Customs, Dwarves, Dwarves In Exile, F/M, Gen, Kid Fic, M/M, One Word Prompt Meme, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-01
Updated: 2013-12-26
Packaged: 2018-01-03 03:19:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 25
Words: 76,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1065135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madame_faust/pseuds/madame_faust
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Each day in December, I will fill a one word prompt for the 25 Days of the Hobbit Advent event - ratings and warnings will vary by fill, please check the beginning notes for each story.</p><p>Day Twenty-Five, Prompt: Family - The Company plays fill-in-the-blank.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Mistletoe (Óin, practicing medicine)

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I own nothing and am making no profit off of this story. 
> 
> **Rating:** General Audience. **Warnings:** Mild description of a sick room and unsanitary conditions, but nothing graphic. 
> 
> Terminology: 'mistiltan' is Old English for 'mistletoe' (because I'm a dork and I like employing regionalisms), 'winterbloom' is another name for 'witch hazel' (because this IS supposed to be an Advent prompt fill, after all).

It was bitterly cold, growing moreso by the minute as the sun sank lower and lower in the sky until only a pale orange light lingered over the horizon, stretched out for miles and miles in every direction.

Óin scowled at the sunset. He hated this place they had come to - granted, he hated every place they settled that wasn’t smack in the middle of an enclave of dwarves, but this had to be the most undwarven wasteland he’d ever had the displeasure of laying eyes upon. Nothing but flat grassy plains as far as the eye could see, good for farming, but not much else. They stopped because the smiths could find work mending and fashioning tools that had been worn passed usefulness during the harvest and the weavers could sell the last of their woolen cloth. Nights like this made folks pay dearly for the promise of a warm cloak and he couldn’t blame him.

It was near suppertime, but Óin was out wandering those desolate moors with fingers that wanted warming by a fire. There were always a few stubborn herbs that resisted the first frost and he was going to gather as many as he could for drying and pounding while he could, even if it meant wringing every last bit of daylight in the search and then some.

As the last rays of the sun died out, he fumbled in his pockets for flint to light his lantern. The wick sparked to life and he idly hoped that Glóin bore him enough brotherly affection to prevent his starting in on Óin’s own supper - or that his father was still quick enough with the back of a knife to smack his hands until he gave up the fight. There was no accounting for the craftiness of growing dwarrow-lads who took any chance they saw to fill their bellies.

The trouble was, Óin reflected as he took his knife to several branches of winterbloom, they kept too far to the north. If their caravans ventured further south, the weather would not be so severe, the price for victuals would be lower and he could get his hands on some fresh aloe, rather than suffering the peddlers who sold overpriced jars of the stuff which might have been mixed with their own piss to bulk up their supply.

Not that anyone asked his opinion. And why should they? His skill was in the healing of wounds, the delivering of infants and if Thrór spared a thought for him most days it had nothing to do with his merit as a navigator. Thráin assumed he groused because he hated being cold. Which was true, but it didn’t make his point less valid.

When he’d gathered as much winterbloom as he could carry, Óin decided to turn back to camp. It was best to ration his supply of oil as the nights grew longer and he could trust neither his brother’s will power or his father’s skill with a knife indefinitely to ensure the safety of his supper.

They were camped very close to the interior of the village, having proved their worth and trustworthiness enough to broker a tentative understanding with the townsfolk. Made fetching water less of a chore, in the mornings, now that they were granted use of the town pumps.

 _Little use those’ll be once they’ve frozen,_ Óin thought gloomily. He was so bogged down with unhelpful, unhappy thoughts that he missed the fact that he was being hailed until he was practically assaulted.

“Master Dwarf!” A woman of Man - a very young woman of Man by the look of her - blocked his way down the road. She had a thin, sharp face and chapped red hands that spoke of work as well as cold. Once she was standing before him, she seemed uncertain of how to proceed and dropped into an awkward bob, hands hanging limply at her sides.

Óin snorted and tried to wave the girl out of his way. “No need to show me such courtesies, lass.”

The girl looked momentarily uncertain. “It’s said you’re all kings in the East,” she told him, hands twisting before her. “I thought - ”

“I’m no king, but a healer,” he said, trying to side-step her to get to his supper. Being gawked at by the curious was a fate he’d resigned himself to, but never learned to like. “Now hie away home with you before you get frostbite - ”

“A _healer,”_ she looked and sounded so delighted that Óin stopped in his tracks, equally wary and curious. “Oh, I’d hoped - my sister is dreadfully ill, sir, my parents have done everything, we haven’t the funds for an apothecary, but I thought a Dwarf might...”

“Might what?” Óin asked, checking his tongue, but his eyes narrowed suspiciously. The trust of Men was hard-won among dwarves, he oughtn’t ruin what Thrór used all his cunning and cajoling to achieve with his bad humor, but the girl was trying his patience.

“Might...might have some magic potion, an incantation,” she said, desperately. “I’ve heard stories, tales. I’m not married yet, but if you spare my sister I’ll promise you my firstborn if that’s what you - ”

Óin held up a hand to stop her before she spewed any more nonsense. “I haven’t any use for children of my _own_ making, let alone some Mannish whelp,” he said testily. “If you’ve come to me to tease and vex, I’ll tell you now, I bear it ill and so will all my kinfolk.”

“I don’t mean to,” she shook her head and Óin noticed uncomfortably that there were tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry, but we don’t have any gold. Nor silver, I thought something else, _please_ name your price, I’ll do anything, give _anything_ , she’s only a child and she’s never been strong, but I l-love her so...I…”

“Enough,” Óin said, unable to take another moment of pleading. “Where does your family live, lass? I’ll look in on her, do what I can, but I haven’t magic or enchantments anymore than you have gold and silver.”

The light of hope that sparked in the girl’s eyes when Óin said he would go with her did not dim when he announced that he had no magic charms to work. “Oh, thank you, sir! Thank you a hundred times!”

Her cold hands hovered briefly in the air a moment, as if she wanted to clasp his, but was wary of actually touching him. Óin cleared his throat and examined her fingers critically, “If you haven’t any gloves, best tuck your hands under your arms, lassie. I wasn’t joking about frostbite.”

It was a long walk to the girl’s home and Óin found himself torn between concern for the sister’s condition - she must have been in dire straits for the lass to offer her firstborn, of all the mad notions - and irritation at the knowledge that his supper would be long devoured by the time he made it back to camp. He only hoped Thráin wasn’t in one of his overwrought moods and imagined that he’d been kidnapped by marauders on the highway. Óin did not think he would survive the humiliation should his cousin organize a search party.

When they arrived at a ragged looking little farmhouse whose roof was badly in need of thatching, the girl ushered Óin in hurriedly. “Come, quickly,” she urged and the moment he was brought over the threshold, he was hit by the stink of the place.

Óin could well understand wanting to keep the cold out and the heat in, but the smell was noxious, not wholesome for the sick or the living. He bore it with only a grimace as the girl pointed to a room with two beds, one of which was occupied by a pitiful little thing, a bundle of bones beneath the blankets that he took to be the sister.

“This room needs to be aired,” he said, shaking his head and moving at once to the little lass’s side. She was white as a sheet, a fine sheen of sweat covered her forehead - understandable, the room was stiflingly hot, which didn’t help the smell. A chamberpot full of sick and other things, less pleasant, wanted cleaning.

“My mother said it ought to be shut up,” the girl said, visibly steeling herself to empty the chamberpot. “To sweat out the sickness.”

Óin clucked his tongue and peeled off his gloves, feeling the child’s hot, clammy forehead and the pulse in her neck, far too slow for one that young. “She’ll sweat whether she’s shut up in here or out in a snowdrift,” he observed grimly. “It’s a bad fever. When you’ve emptied that pot, bring me some cold water, cleanest you have. Can she keep anything down?”

The girl hovered in the doorway and replied nervously, “She was drinking broth and a little bread, but ever since she took the mistletoe, she’s worse than before.”

Óin swore an oath and the girl’s eyes went wide. “And who gave the order for that?” he asked angrily.

“The-the apothecary, sir,” she swallowed hard, either because of the smell or her own nerves, Óin could not work out, but he tried to school his features into a less ornery expression. “Said as we couldn’t afford a tincture, it was best we gathered the herbs and applied them ourselves.”

It took every bit of self restraint Óin possessed not to curse their stingy apothecary on the spot. As it was, he swallowed his own gall and turned his attention back to the girl on the bed, removing two of the quilts that were tucked so tightly around her that he was sure she could not move her arms, if she was of a mind to.

Her eyes opened then, glazed, hazel that did not seem alarmed at all to see a strange dwarf folding quilts by her bedside. On the contrary, beneath the glaze of fever, she seemed oddly enchanted.

“Are you a goblin?” she asked, breathlessly.

“Certainly not,” Óin scoffed, laying the extra coverings on the foot of the bed. “I am a dwarf, young miss. Óin, is what they call me. At your service.”

“I’m Ana,” she said, smiling faintly. “Do you have cherries? In the songs, goblins have cherries. Do dwarves?”

“Not this time of year,” he informed her, but she seemed pleased to have met a creature from legend, whether he came bearing cherries or not. Her smile broadened when she saw her sister return with a bowl of water.

“Una!” she called, then coughed terribly, a horrible rasping rattle that made Óin frown. The girl could scarce draw breath and the village kill-or-cure wanted her puking her guts up with mistiltan infusions! If Óin got his hands on him, he’d put him out of business permanently.

Once Ana caught her breath, she managed a smile for her sister. The girl’s sleeve was wet with spit and phlegm, but mercifully there was no blood. Óin took a step closer and looked seriously into the girl’s eyes.

“Miss Ana,” he said and she giggled at the formal address. “If you will allow me, I am going to put my hand upon your chest and I want you to take a deep breath, as deep as you can. Do I have your permission?”

She nodded as enthusiastically as she could, given her overall weakness. “Are you going to make me well?” she asked.

Óin pursed his lips and replied, “Deep breath in, please. And out. There’s a lass. Can you sit up a bit, or - ”

“What is this?” A voice thundered over Óin’s head and he removed his hand from the girl immediately, though it was with great annoyance that he turned around and saw a Man coming through the doorway, nearly knocking Una over in his haste to get to Óin. “What are you doing to my daughter?”

“He’s a healer, Papa,” Una said, coming forward, still clutching the bowl of water. “He said he - ”

 _“He_ is a dwarf,” the Man said contemptuously. “I don’t deal with dwarves.”

“Your elder daughter does,” Óin informed him testily. “She begged my assistance on the road, very wise too. Though I am a stranger here, I don’t mind telling you that your apothecary conducts a shameful business.”

The Man seemed slightly taken aback; evidently he was not aware that dwarves possessed the ability to hold a civil conversation, much less critique the quality of apothecaries. He recovered his voice soon enough to say, “Out of my house. At once. She had no business speaking to you, much less taking you into my home. Get out or I’ll _force_ you out.”

 _How?_ Óin wanted to ask, but refrained. Raising his empty hands to show he had no weapons (that the Man could see, at any rate), he walked slowly toward the doorway, speaking all the while. “I’d keep a cool cloth on her head and the back of her neck. Air out the room at the warmest time of day, keep the fire stoked half as high as you have it now. If she can stand being taken from her bed, launder her blankets, give her a clean shift and a cool bath - and no more mistletoe. It’s a noxious parasite that seizes the bowels and slows the blood. If your worthless apothecary stocks elderberry - ”

A vein was working in the father’s neck now, reddened from fury. “Get. Out,” he seethed.

A Woman, a smaller child wrapped in a shawl, held to her breast stood in the sitting room, concern written all over her face. “Ben, what is this?”

“Out!” the Man bellowed. “Out, damn you! If you’ve done her a harm, dwarf, I’ll have you and all your ilk driven from the village!”

A muscle worked in Óin’s jaw, unseen beneath his beard, but it was the only sign he gave that he was at all moved by the Man’s blustering.

“Madam,” he inclined his head toward the Woman and redirected his attention to the husband. “I’ll be on my way, but if you have any care for your daughter’s life, you’ll heed me. You mightn’t know much about the ways of my people, but I’ll tell you this - we do not lie, not about our crafts. Mine is healing, and I do it honestly. Think on that, sir, before you pour more poison down that child’s throat.”

* * *

The journey back to the camp went quicker than his journey to Miss Una’s homestead, at least he remembered less of it. Snow was starting to fall by the time he got back and he was pleased to see a small fire still burned outside his family’s lean-to - and astonished to see a small pot kept warm in the ashes.

“I swatted your brother away,” his mother said as he approached, her smile warm as the flames by her side. “What’s kept you so long? Thráin was getting worried.”

Óin dropped his sack by his mother’s feet with a sneer, “The day Thráin stops getting nervy about every little thing is a day I shouldn’t like to see, for it’ll mean the world is ending. Bless that miserable bastard’s heart.”

Maeva pretended not to hear him. “Bread pudding,” she said, dishing the last of it up for him. “With sausage, apples and cheese - just the thing for a cold night.”

Óin muttered his thanks and dug in, not complaining when his mother’s hands found their way into his hair and began combing out his braids. He was not a dwarfling, he did not require such care, but he was too hungry to fight her on it - why waste breath that was better saved in eating?

Keeping her silence, Maeva hummed idly, off-tune, as she worked. Singing was not a strong suit of hers, but the rhythm was a comfort, however irregular. When Óin had quite finished his supper, he lay the bowl aside and stared into the fire a while before he said, “I was waylaid by a maiden coming back, a Woman - hardly that, a girl of Men. Her sister’s taken ill and they haven’t money for an apothecary. She offered me her firstborn, should she ever have one.”

Maeva tsked, “The poor lassie must be badly off. Did you go?”

“Aye,” Óin sighed and rubbed his eyes, made hot and dry by the firelight. “The sweating sickness. If the child was heartier, I’d think more favorably on her chances, but the family is poor and their apothecary might as well open up a side business as an undertaker for all the good he did them. Told them to give the girl mistiltan.”

Maeva sat beside her eldest son and patted his arm soothingly. “Curse his hands,” she said, sadly, not ferociously, as Óin had. The both knew the way of it in these little villages, when times were hard, any herb would suffice in an infusion to cure sickness, if folks were desperate enough. Mistiltan, or mistletoe as these Men called it, was so toxic a body did all it could to get rid of it.

Óin heard tell of some using it for poisonings, logic being that, if the body worked to get rid of the herb, so too would go the poison. Some survived such treatment, but they were dwarves grown, not little underfed girls in stuffy rooms.

“Has it gotten to her lungs?”

“If it hasn’t, it’s a near thing,” he sighed heartily. “Didn’t get a good sense of it, her father came in, started bellowing how he doesn’t have dealings with our people and for me to get away from his house.”

“Oh, dear. Could you do anything for them?” Maeva asked gently.

Óin shook his head, “Precious little. Told them to air out the room, clean the sheets, douse the fire, stop _poisoning_ the wee wretch, but the father wanted me thrown on my backside and I took my leave.”

“Men have their pride,” his mother remarked, squeezing his arm. “Just like anyone else.”

Óin pulled his arm away and stared at the dying flames. “His pride’ll cost him his daughter’s life,” he predicted darkly. “But then, Men don’t care for girl children as we do. I suppose he’ll be relieved.”

The swat on the arm he received in place of the patting surprised him and he looked down at his mother, who fixed him with a firm look.

“None of that,” she said sternly. “Just because a soul does more harm than good in ignorance, it doesn’t tell you a thing about how much they love their children. Your pride may have been injured, but that doesn’t give you the right to be cruel.”

Rising from her place beside him, Maeva left her son to clean up the remains of supper. “I’ve got some dried elderberries ready to be stewed and pressed,” she said before retreating to the interior of their makeshift home. “See if things don’t look better in the morning.”

Óin sat before the fire until it burned itself out and he felt the cold all over again.

* * *

Things looked _warmer_ in the morning, if nothing else. He jabbed Glóin in the hand when the little goblin tried to sneak his own fork into Óin’s bacon. Not hard enough to break the skin, just hard enough to hurt. Little bastard howled like a warg, but he kept his nose in his own breakfast afterward.

Óin was settling out the leaves and stems of the winterbloom for drying when he noticed a small cauldron boiling away on in the ashes and one whiff of sweetness on the air told him it was the elderberries his mother talked about the night before.

“I wouldn’t bother,” he sighed, shaking his head hopelessly. “It’ll be a waste.”

Maeva made a little humming noise and stirred the mixture. “Aye, or it’ll be the difference between life and death. If your pride can risk another blow, would you mind giving them a second chance?”

“This has nothing to do with chances,” Óin grumbled. “They said they didn’t want me in the house, should I convince them we’re daft as well as wicked?”

His mother’s hair was tied well out of her face with a scarf, but a few orange-red tendrils escaped nevertheless and she blew them out of her face in irritation. “Stubborn, maybe, but not daft,”she replied with a small smile. “And our stubbornness is well accounted for, especially in this family. Will you go? Or have I truly wasted my morning?”

The two engaged in an impromptu staring contest as Óin contemplated his response. Rejection he was well used to. It stung, no doubt, being daily reminded of how far they’d fallen and what a long way they were from home. Exiled. Outcast. Unwanted.

Ah, but that wasn’t entirely true. The sister wanted him there. The sister, Miss Una, ventured into the unknown, afraid, but brave for Miss Ana’s sake. If she marched to the edge of a dwarven encampment when all she knew of dwarves were tales of child-snatching and magic, he could risk being shouted at by a Man who was just as afraid and not nearly as brave.

The cottage looked shabbier by daylight and in the back of his mind, Óin wondered if his young cousins could not be prevailed upon to make a few repairs on the cheap. The doorknocker was broken, so he rapped on the wood itself, waiting to be admitted. The Woman, not Una, answered, her brow creasing when she beheld the dwarven stranger.

Balin would have been a good companion to bring along, he had a knack for putting Men at their ease. He would have made a low bow, smiled, called the Woman Goodwife and charmed her into letting them over the threshold. Óin was all blunt forthrightness and no charm, he brought himself and his skills and little else.

“Is your husband home?” he asked without pleasantries.

The Woman shook her head, it took her a moment to find her voice, “No, he and my son have gone to the forest for firewood.”

Óin nodded to himself, “Good,” he said and she moved to shut the door, fearful, but he held the jar of elderberries out to her and his wrist stopped the door being slammed shut in his face. Without flinching as the wood pressed into his arm, he said, “Stir that in hot water and give it to the child every few hours, her cough should improve. There’s enough in that jar to last you five days.”

The Woman stared at him, nervous, but she eased the door off his arm and took the jar in her hands, squinting at it. “What - ”

“Elderberries, as I said last night,” he replied, a little testily. “Boiled into a syrup, but you’ll want to mix it with hot water. That’ll be easier for the girl to drink.”

The Women tried to hand the jar back to him. The fear was largely gone, since Óin stayed on the other side of the door and made no motion to enter, but regret was stealing over her face and into her hazel eyes. Must have been where little Ana got them from. “We haven’t any money, we have no way to pay you.”

“Did I ask for payment?” Óin queried. When the Woman did not move, he pressed again, “Did I?”

“No,” she admitted, warily. “But...but you may, someday. I know my daughter made an offer to you and - ”

“Madam,” Óin said, rolling his eyes skyward. “In addition to being a healer of no little skill, I am a midwife of some renown, going on eighty years now. Furthermore, I’m possessed of a goblin-sneak of a younger brother who has yet to reach his majority to say nothing of his sneakier cousins who vex me daily. Believe me when I say that I’ve got more than my fair share of younglings of my own kind and - meaning no slight on you and yours - I’ve neither the need nor desire to take any children of Men into my care.”

The Woman almost smiled. Almost. But in any case, she took the bottle of syrup and opened the door a little wider. “Would you - would you look in on her? We...after my husband left this morning, we opened the windows, she seems a little easier.”

Óin required no further invitation. “Did you strip the bedding?”

The Woman nodded and he advised her, “Boil the sheets. And her shifts. We change the bandages of the injured regularly, so too should the bedding of the infirm be changed and washed.”

The Woman’s brow wrinkled, “But why? If there’s no blood on them?”

“The sweat and sick of the ill can’t be wholesome,” Óin informed her. “Pestilence can run wild without bloodshed - ah, here’s the invalid.”

Una was sitting by her sister’s bedside with a small loom in her lap, weaving and she looked up, astonished, when Óin strode in. “Master Dwarf, you came back!” she cried delighted.

“He’s called Óin,” Ana said weakly from the bed. “That’s his name. Since I know your name, Mister Dwarf, does that me you’ll grant me a wish?”

Óin couldn’t help smiling at the lass, despite himself, “Ah, you know what I’m called,” he said, “but you don’t know my Name.”

Before she could inquire further, he pulled a long trumpet from his satchel and advised her to sit up a bit that he might listen to her breathe. With a little assistance from her mother and sister - and the support of a few pillows - she managed it. Though the girl could not breathe deeply without coughing, Óin was tolerably sure that her lungs were not taking on fluid; if they were, elderberry could do little to ease her symptoms.

He sent the mother off to boil water and informed Miss Ana about the medicine he was going to give her. “Might make you a bit queasy, but it’ll be a damned bit better than that awful stuff you took before,” he said, prompting the little miss to widen her eyes and giggle. “What?”

“You said a naughty word,” she whispered and clarified, even more softly, “You said, _damned.”_

Óin snorted, “Here now, none of that. I’ve lived long enough to use which words I like.”

“How old are you?” Ana asked, eyes shining more with curiosity, less with that deathly fever glaze.

“One hundred and seventy-seven,” was her healer’s prompt response.

The lassie’s mouth dropped open, giving Óin a good view of the back of her throat; red and swollen, but despite the pain, she spoke on, “Really? If you’re so old, why are you so little?”

Drawing himself up to his full height Óin said, with a bit of false bluster, “I am _not_ little. I’ll have you know I’m considered quite tall among my folk.”

Ana shook her head and replied slyly, “Una’s taller than you and she’s not so tall.”

“But more slender by half!” Una sang out, returning with a mug of steaming water, mixed with syrup. Considering Óin again, she added, “More than half.”

The syrup was administered with slow sips, interrupted only by Miss Ana pausing to smile at Óin and remark that the concoction was much tastier than the medicine she’d been given before. Thanking the girl for the compliment, he watched her carefully, silently acknowledging that taste mattered little, if it didn’t do anything to help the girl.

“If you don’t trade in infants,” Una asked once Ana was settled back down and dozing, her breath wheezing worryingly on every inhale, though she assured Óin that her sister sounded better by far than she had in days, “what do you trade in?”

Óin shrugged, washing his hands in the remains of the boiled water from the kettle. “Gold, silver and copper, for those who can pay.”

“And for those who can’t?” her mother asked, drawing closer with the infant on her hip again.

They were so worried, so wary still, and they needn’t be. Óin did not lie when he said he conducted his work fairly and honestly. He never asked more than a soul could afford as payment for his healing. For those who could not afford any of it, he asked nothing at all.

“I’m going to tell you a secret of the Dwarves,” he said, watching mother and daughter exchange a surprised glance. “Not a very large secret, but it is something you wouldn’t know if you didn’t ask. We can no more stop working than the sun can cease moving from one bit of sky to another or the frost can stop itself freezing the earth. We don’t work just for profit, it’s bone-deep, what we’re Made to do. Payment enough for me will be seeing that lass rise from her bed on her own and get a bit of color in those cheeks. I mean that with all my heart.”

Una smiled broadly and reached out to press Óin’s hands, boldly, without fear. “Oh, _thank you_ , Master Dwarf. Over and over, thank you.”

“I thank you as well,” her mother came close by, shifting the infant in her arms. “And I apologize, for my husband. We’re not worldly, we’ve never set foot outside our little patch of earth, we might be backwards in our notions of things - ”

Óin shook his head and held up a hand to quiet her. “There’s no need to apologize,” he said, feeling he owed his mother a small debt of gratitude for speaking one. “I’ll not take insult for words spoken in haste and ignorance.”

Removing his other hand from Una’s light grip, he bowed slightly to them and said, “I’ll take my leave of you. Remember, fresh air when the weather permits, cool cloths when her fever spikes and tea every few hours. If you have need of me, you know where to find me.”

When he came back, a little after noontime, his mother was waiting and she smiled at his empty hands. “Waste of time?” she asked lightly.

Óin took one of her hands and kissed her fingers. “A blessing on your hands - I bow to your wisdom and skill,” he said and Maeva pulled him close and kissed the tip of his nose.

“There’s my good lad,” she grinned. “I knew you had it in you. And let’s hope that lassie has spirit enough to pull through.”

“Let’s hope,” he agreed.

* * *

It was nearly a fortnight before he heard back from that family. Once again he was diverted from his quest for a meal by a call of, “Master Dwarf!”

Glóin had been conscripted into the search for fungi that if eaten, wouldn’t result in the encampment puking its guts out all night afterward. He was plodding along in his brother’s wake, picking the mushrooms that Óin said were suitable for eating. Turned out he didn’t have quite the head for herbology that he had for numbers.

“Stop dragging your feet!” Óin snapped, pointing at a nearby cluster. “There, pick those, make yourself useful, I’d like to get back before midnight - ”

“Master Dwarf!”

Óin and Glóin turned their heads as one and saw Miss Una jogging toward them across the field. Right on her heels was a strapping lad that Óin took to be the elder brother. The mother came next, less swiftly, the youngest in her arms. The father was last to approach - with Miss Ama on his back, bundled up in a coat that was two sizes too big for her, but the girl was smiling and waving.

“Friends of yours?” Glóin asked, cocking his head to the side and looking his brother over with astonishment in his eyes.

“After a fashion,” Óin replied, unable to hide his grin. “How fares my invalid?

“Excellent well!” Una replied, dropping into her awkward bob of a curtsy again, eyes shining with happiness. “You told me a falsehood when first we met - you _do_ work magic, Master Dwarf, by my life you do!”

Óin shook his head. “Not magic, just honest work,” he corrected her, but Una refused to be convinced. “I’m pleased to have been of service, in any case.”

The brother seemed as bold as his younger sister, he rushed forward and seized Óin’s hand without warning, pumping it furiously. “Thank you, sir,” he said all in a rush. “For what you did for my sister, for all of us, I wish I had more to give you than thanks, but I mean it with all that I am.”

“Little matter,” Óin said, loosing his hand from the lad’s grip - impressively strong for a Man. “That is to say, your thanks is payment enough.”

“Oh!” the mother started in surprise when she saw Glóin beside him, who suddenly lost decades in demeanor and went shy, inching closer to Óin until he was hiding behind him. “Is this your brother?”

“It surely is, madam, would that it wasn’t,” Óin replied, giving Glóin a sharp jab in the arm. “Where are your manners, lad? Greet the lady.”

“Evening, ma’am,” Glóin mumbled, looking between the Mannish family and his brother in confusion.

The father came last of all and his countenance was grave. “I mean to apologize,” he said seriously, stooping so that he and Óin were more or less on a level. “I feared for my daughter’s life, it made me unwelcoming and uncharitable. I don’t know what I can say or do that can ever properly express my thanks for your good work. I wish I had something to give you, but you...I cannot put a price on my daughter’s life.”

“Nor can I,” Óin said, sticking out a hand which the father pressed firmly. “So let us settle the matter by saying your daughter is priceless and that is that. I must...I owe you an apology as well. I believe we both misjudged one another.”

“What a blessing you are of a kindly disposition,” the wife remarked, “and came back.”

Beside Óin, Glóin could not suppress a snort of disbelief. “Kindly? _Him?”_ he asked the Woman. “Ma’am, I think you’ve got the wrong dwarf.”

The Woman laughed, a dry, husky sound that stirred the babe to waking. “I have not,” she smiled. “Master Óin. A name I will remember and bless all my days.”

“That’s not his name,” Ana piped up. “It’s only what he’s called - Papa, put me down, please.”

Her father obliged, only a bit reluctantly and let his daughter walk to Óin, a mischievous smile on her face. She was still too thin and there was a marked weakness in her limbs, but her cheeks were red with mirth and cold, not flushed with fever.

“You said you wouldn’t, but you granted my wish anyway,” Ana told him. “You made me well again, just as I asked.”

“So I did,” Óin nodded and smiled at her. “Don’t go spreading it around now, I don’t grant wishes to just anyone, only special sorts who deserve it.”

“Oh, I won’t, I promise,” she vowed. Then, little Ana took his hands to steady herself and leaned up on her toes to kiss his cheek. As she pulled away, something in the tree overhead caught her eyes and she pulled a face. “So long as you promise to tell everyone _that’s_ no good for them.”

Above their heads, a cluster of mistletoe clung to the trunk of a skinny tree, bright green against brown bark. From this angle, it looked rather pretty against the grey sky, but Óin could find no beauty in it.

“I surely shall,” he reassured her, patting the girl gently on the head. “It’s a promise.”


	2. Gingerbread (Thyra and Túfi, sibling bonding)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Rating:** General Audience **Warnings:** None, this is pure family fluff.
> 
> Túfi and Thyra are roughly following the Smitten Kitchen gingerbread recipe which can be found here: http://smittenkitchen.com/blog/2008/12/gramercy-taverns-gingerbread/

Bubbles frothed and foamed at the surface of the cooling bowl of stout and treacle, forming a thick head that Túfi dearly wanted to stick his fingers into. Fortunately for the bakery patrons, Thyra had sharp eyes and was quick with a wooden spoon. A sharp rap on the knuckles of his itching fingers soon diverted the dwarrow lad’s attention to the task at hand.

“Come along now,” his sister tsked, handing him a small mortar and pestle. Within were a handful of cloves, ready to be smashed to a powder. “You was the one who asked to help me, let’s make ourselves useful, eh?”

“Sorry,” Túfi said, sitting up straighter on the stool beside her, smashing the cloves with wild abandon. 

“Ey now, not so hard,” she said, wrapping her fingers around his hands and gentling his strokes. “That’s no orc you’re braining, have a care - and don’t let’s lose too many pieces over the side, there’s me best lad.”

Thyra was smashing ginger root with her own pestle, larger and heavier than his and more expertly wielded. The dried root had been crushed to a fine powder, which she dumped into a larger bowl for mixing with flour and the other spices needed for the loaf. For nigh on a month they’d been getting hounded about when the spice bread was going to be sold, for it was one of their most popular items bought at the bakery and one of the most expensive.

Sweet and spicy, their family’s gingerbread was counted the best in the Ered Luin and always sold out before noon when they baked it, never mind that it was a bit dear. The marketplace had been a treat at harvest time, the fruits and vegetables new-gathered from the lowlands mixed with exotic spices and other treats from the East and South, arrived by caravan. Da sent Thyra out with strict instructions of how much to buy, what prices were fair, and _be sure to weigh it out by your own hand._

Thyra always got a good price and the merchants liked her, her sweet smile and teasing way of talking. This year she even got a few ounces more than she paid for - for the family’s sake, they winked.

Túfi stood by and tried not to frown as he carried one of their market baskets over his arm. It was getting heavy with the bags they’d purchased, but he didn’t complain. The weight of their purchases was fine, he just wished everyone would stop yammering about the _baby._

Bad enough last year when she married Bombur and moved away, he still saw her nearly every day in the shop or at their parents’ home, but now she was going to have a baby and everyone was _so_ pleased for her, and it was such a _blessing_ that it’d come on so soon after the wedding, and Túfi wished the lot of them would dunk their heads in boiling oil and shut up about it.

It was getting harder to forget about, especially now with the way his sister’s stomach pushed out against her apron. Túfi took care to avoid bumping into her, not for fear of causing her a harm, but because he didn’t like the reminder that he was about to be replaced. He hadn’t given her a proper hug in over a month, every time she tried to tug him close, he wiggled away.

“There, that’s better,” Thyra said, ruffling his straw-colored hair fondly as she looked over his work. The bump of her belly was perilously close to his elbow and he inched away, taking the cloves with him. She frowned, but didn’t say anything, just took up a file and grated some nutmeg into the bowl along with the ginger and cinnamon already waiting in the bottom. “Not too much nutmeg. You know why?”

“‘Cos it’s dear?” he replied, more a question than a reply. Whenever he was in the kitchen, his mother and father usually gave him orders for pouring and measuring and mixing or whatever else it was he needed to do. If not them, then Thyra, since he was the baby of the family and needed guidance.

Well. He _was_ the baby of the family. Not for much longer, though.

“Aye, it’s dear,” she nodded. “But a wee bit goes a long way - I ever tell you about the time I ground up half a pod and used a whole lemon in the turnovers? Skins and all?”

“Da spat ‘em on the ground,” Túfi smiled despite himself. “And said they needed work. Bombur ate ‘em though, didn’t he?”

“Aye,” she grinned and rolled her eyes. “One of ‘em, poor lad. It was the most romantical thing he’s ever done for me.”

Túfi liked Bombur and had even forgiven him for taking his favorite sister away (he wasn’t supposed to have favorites, being that he had two other sisters, but Thyra was his favorite even if it wasn’t polite to say so), but now they were married and having a baby and ruining his life. He didn’t laugh at the story, though his sister clearly expected him to find it as funny as he had every other time it was told.

Instead of laughing or even grinning, Túfi narrowed his eyes and continued pounding the cloves until Thyra took the pestle out of his hands and dumped the mortar’s contents into the big mixing bowl.

“Flour?” she asked and he hopped off his stool to fetch it. This was his favorite part, getting to stick his hands in the finely milled flour, nearly as good as wetting his fingers in the bubbles caused by the beer. “Do it how I taught you.”

How Thyra taught Túfi to measure flour was the same as her parents taught her. As many spoonfuls as would fit in the cup and then scrape the excess off the top with the back of the spoon. Light and fluffy, not clumpy and dense. There was a certain satisfaction to sticking his arm elbow-deep in a bag, raising a cloud of dust as he did, but it wouldn’t make the cakes taste better and the first batch of the season ought to come out perfectly. 

“In the bowl?” he asked, coming forward with his cup, full to the top.

“In the bowl, dearie,” she confirmed and Túfi scowled as he followed her instructions.

For he wasn’t going to be her dearie much longer. Da as good as said so, ‘When the baby’s born, you’ll have to pick up more work,’ and Ma added, back in the summertime when he was eager to run to his sister’s home and show her a fish he’d hooked, ‘You won’t be able to run over to their house any aul time once the baby’s come.’

Myrra, his third-oldest sister and second-youngest in the family was positively beaming when she teased him, “I remember how it was when _you_ was born. Everyone cooing and coming to call. You’ll be lucky if Thyra remembers your _name_ once she’s got a baby all her own.”

Playacting that a bit of dust from the flour got in his eye, Túfi rubbed at his eyes roughly with the heels of his hands and tried to hide a sniffle. There were six of them in all and he was the youngest, Thyra the eldest and she always looked after him, kept an eye on him when their parents were working, taught him how to knead dough and whip up eggs and cream and churn milk to butter. 

She listened to him when he was having troubles and didn’t tease him as the others did. She called him her best lad - even after she married Bombur she kissed him right away and said he was _still_ her best lad, but he wouldn’t be if she had a baby. Mas loved their own best and above all others. 

The way Túfi saw it, a body could only have so much love in it, like how a sack could only hold a certain measure of flour before it got too full. Thyra loved their parents and her brothers and sisters and now Bombur, not to mention her friends and a baby took up a _lot_ of love. He was sure there wouldn’t be any room for him, when all was said and done. 

Thyra hunkered down and put a hand on his shoulder, tilting his chin up with the other. “Here now,” she said gently. “What’s all this?”

“Nothin’,” Túfi mumbled, looking away. “A bit o’dust, no more.”

Pursing her lips, his sister favored him with a very skeptical look. “I know you think you’re getting too old for me to be looking after you,” she said and Túfi raised his head again, perplexed. “But that’s no good reason to start telling untruths. You was always honest with me and growing up a wee bit’s no reason to leave off talking ‘bout your troubles.”

“I’m not grown up,” Túfi declared, loudly, more loudly than he meant to, but Thyra didn’t back away, just gave him that wide-eyed listening face that she wore when he had something important to say and he was going to _miss_ that face when she forgot him. _“You’re_ the one who’s grown and gone away.”

“Gone away?” she asked, spreading her arms and giving him a wry smile. “Who’s gone away? Down the road a ways, sometimes, but I’m here now, eh?”

Túfi sniffled again and wiped his nose on his sleeve, “Not forever. Soon enough you’ll be all shut away and won’t see me no more.”

“Really?” she asked, folding her arms over her chest. “This is all new gossip, when am I due to turn into the village hermit?”

“Springtime,” he frowned hard at the floor, at the spots of flour on his boots, then glared hardest at the bump under his sister’s apron. “When the baby comes and you forget all about me.” 

Comprehension dawned all over Thyra’s face, leaving her squint-eyed and slackjawed. Túfi turned away miserably and was taken utterly aback when his sister grabbed him right around the middle and hugged him to her so hard he couldn’t run off if he tried. She kissed him too, noisy and wet all over his face, like her friend Hervor was fond of doing, but this time Túfi didn’t find it a nuisance.

“Come on, now, who’s me best lad?” she said, bending her forehead to touch his. 

“Not me,” Túfi denied, crying in earnest now. Thyra picked up the edge of her apron and mopped at his face, her own eyes gone watery and bright. “Not for always. Myrra said, she said you’d forget all about me when the baby comes, you won’t even ‘member me name.”

Thyra favored her brother with a frank look. “Myrra reckons I’m dull as ditchwater,” she said flatly. “I amn’t scholarly, to be sure, but I think I’m sharp enough to remember me own brother’s name. It’s not so long nor complicated as all that.” 

Túfi had to admit that his name was _not_ very long, but that wasn’t the point. “You won’t have room,” he announced hopelessly. “In your head nor your heart. The baby’ll take it all up and I’ll get pushed by the wayside.”

“Oh…” Thyra sighed and pulled Túfi close in another hug. He wrapped his arms around her for the first time in an age and sniffled again. “Oh, you...it’s not true, lovey, not even a wee bit. Why, Mam and Da have got the six of us and I weren’t forced out when you come along, was I?”

“That’s different,” he mumbled into her tunic. “You’re their very own.”

“And you’re me very own too,” she said seriously, pulling away to look him in the face. “Me very own brother and I won’t love you no less for having a baby - I wouldn’t love you no less for having a dozen babies.”

A look of horror came over Túfi’s face and he clutched Thyra tighter. 

“Don’t you be doing that,” he pleaded. Suddenly confronted by the idea of his sister’s attention being diverted from him a dozen times over, the idea of _one_ baby no longer seemed so daunting. “One’s enough. One’s plenty.”

Thyra laughed softly and kissed him again. “Seems it’s long past time you and me had a talk,” she said, putting an arm around his shoulder and leading him back to the table. “You stir up them spices with the flour while I get to beating the eggs and sugar and tell you what’s what, eh?”

Túfi nodded and solemnly took up a spoon, stirring the dry ingredients slowly as his sister spoke.

“Now, I won’t lie to you and tell you things won’t be no different,” she said, cracking eggs expertly, not dropping one shell into the bowl. “Likely I will have to spend more time apart from you, with the babe, they take a good bit o’minding - but Dís had little Fíli and we still see her out and about, don’t we? She’s not been shut away.”

Forced to admit that this was true, Túfi nodded, watching the dark spices blend with the lighter flour until they were were well combined. Thyra took up a metal whisk and furiously beat the eggs, buttermilk, and sugar together, without spilling a single drop. “But you can come see me whenever you’ve a mind to. I might ask you to hold the little lad - or, lass, but it’ll probably be a lad - while you’re there. What do you think of that?”

Túfi thought for a moment. He got to hold Fíli when Dís came visiting with Víli and her brother, he didn’t do much, just lay there sleeping. It wasn’t hard. “I wouldn’t mind that,” he conceded, then made a face. “Would I have to wash him if he stunk?”

Thyra laughed again and shook her head at the bowl; the eggs weren’t quite done yet. “Not if you don’t want to, leave that to me or Bombur - or Ma. As a matter of fact, I’ll bet you a penny you see me more once the babe’s born than you do now, Mam’ll be at the place all hours, won’t be able to pry her away, you ought to come with her and keep me merry.”

This time Túfi was able to manage a genuine smile. “I can do that,” he said, craning his neck up to see if the eggs were frothy yet. “Can I put the treacle in?”

“You may,” she said, and Túfi ran eagerly to the other side of the table to fetch the bowl. “Both hands!”

“Can I beat it?” he asked eagerly, though he knew before his sister started shaking her head that the answer would be ‘no.’

“Not yet,” she said, taking up the whisk again. “Not for a few years more - and that’s something, when you’re a wee bit older, you can teach the babe how to make cakes. Order him to do all the tasks you’re not keen on.”

The notion was novel to Túfi; being the youngest, he was forever being told what to do and what not to do. The idea that someday he might have a little minion to order about pleased him more than anything else. “I can order him to sweep up the shop?”

“Aye,” Thyra nodded. 

“An’ fetch coal and wood for the ovens?”

“Aye.”

“An’...an’ go to the market to fetch all what I forgot?”

His sister’s laughter was merry as she nodded again, “Aye, aye, _all_ that - mind you spare him a few pennies for a treat if you send him to do your fetching for you. We done the same for you all these years.”

The idea of parting with his hard-earned pennies took some of the shine off that minion notion. 

“Oh,” Túfi frowned. “Well, mayhap I won’t have him do me fetching. I’ll do it meself and buy me own treats.”

When the loaves were ready to go in the ovens, Thyra supervised as Túfi filled each of the molds for baking with the batter and the pair of them cleaned up while they waited for the cakes to finish baking. Thyra sang during the dull bits of work, made it all go by quicker. 

“He sawed and he squeaked and he quickened the tune,” she sang, grabbing Túfi’s hand and swinging him round, making him giggle. “While the landlord shook the Man in the Moon - ”

“‘It’s after three,’ he said!” Túfi finished grandly. The air was heavy with the scent of spices baking away, sweetened by the treacle. Thyra ruffled his hair again, ruining his braids once and for all. 

“I’ll set those to rights once the cakes are out,” she said, opening the ovens and turning the pans quickly, with bare fingers that only just felt the heat of the metal before she snatched her hands safely away. Her right hand gave the tins a shake while her left settled atop her stomach and she gave Túfi a wink. “Seems you and your nephew have some talents in common - you’re both fond of a dance.”

“Dance?” he asked, his brow creasing. 

Thyra gestured him to her side, “Aye, he’s kicking up a rumpus, come here, have a feel.” 

Túfi was hesitant about placing his hand against his sister’s stomach, but he did it, albeit lightly. Half a second later something bumped up against his palm and he pulled away in shock. “What’s he doing? Kicking your innards?”

“Aye, feels that way sometimes,” she chuckled. 

Frowning contemplatively at his sister’s midsection, he asked, “He can’t hear me if I shout, can he?”

“Likely not,” Thyra replied, checking on the cakes of them. The smallest, the one she’d put in for herself and Túfi to test for quality, was done and she removed it from the oven to cool before she turned it out of its pan. “Why? What’ve you got to say?”

“I was going to tell him to be nice to me sister,” Túfi replied. “Elsewise, I won’t teach him how to make no cakes when he’s born and grown a bit.”

Giving his head another fond pat, Thyra smiled softly and said, “Dearie, if this laddie turns out to be half as sweet as you, I’ll count meself blessed. Now, how’s about I whip up some cream and we have a taste? Still hot, just the way you like it.”

Their mother and father maintained that spiced cakes were better after they’d cooled and sat a few hours, but Thyra always indulged Túfi’s preference for cakes warm from the oven. He hoped that was something else she remembered once her head was filled up with thoughts of the baby - he wouldn’t have thought so, at first, but now he had reason to hope that there was room in his sisters head and heart for both of them. 

Thyra cut him a piece of cake and the steam rose from the middle, filling Túfi’s freckled nose a scant second before he stuffed his mouth full of warm sweetness. “Any good?” she asked.

“The best,” he answered, spraying her with crumbs. Clamping his hand over his mouth, he giggled up at her, “Oops.”

“I’ll give you ‘oops,’” Thyra grumbled with mock outrage, reaching into the bowl and daubing him on the nose with freshly whipped cream. The food was too good to waste in a fight, so rather than heaving another forkful of cake at his sister, Túfi tucked in, serving himself another large bite. 

As Thyra sliced herself a piece, Túfi looked at her seriously as he could with fluffy cream caught in the whitish-yellow hair on his upper lip. “Thyra,” he asked, nervously. “You...you promise you won’t love the new baby more’n me?”

“Let’s not be talking ‘bout more and less,” she said, laying her own fork down and looking Túfi dead in the eyes. “S’not either-or, it’s _and._ Just ‘cos I’ll have a wee one to love, it don’t mean I won’t pay you no more mind or that I got to give up some love for you and let him have it. Love’s not a cake as can be gobbled up and gone. It just...just is. And there’s plenty to go around, don’t you doubt that, alright?”

“Alright,” Túfi nodded after a moment’s contemplation, eating the crumbs on his plate one by one. When not a morsel remained he looked at his sister again. “Thyra?”

She swallowed her mouthful before she replied, “Aye?”

“D’you love me enough to give me half o’your cake?”

With a hoot of laughter, she pulled her plate closer and held her her fork threateningly. “Ah, laddie,” she grinned, eyes sparkling. “I might have love enough to go around for babies and brothers - but I’m not half so generous when it comes to me gingerbread.”


	3. Mulled Wine (Dori, lost love)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** M/M slash but it's incredibly tame. We're talking kitten-level tame.
> 
> I should be finishing an exam right now, but I'm incredibly frustrated and so I'm uploading this to prove I've actually accomplished something recently.

A ladle of wine, tart and sweet all at once, was his sole companion for the evening. Dori didn’t mind, he was perfectly satisfied with his own company. Preferred it, honestly.

It was a rare and precious thing to have a night all to himself, no younger brothers underfoot, no mother gently nagging him to do this or that, go here or there. Ori was spending the evening with Dís’s sons and Ama was gone to sup with some friends of hers and implied that he shouldn’t bother keeping a candle burning for her.

Dori never lacked for supper invitations himself, but unlike his mother he did not respond positively to every invitation he was extended. What would folks think? That he was a leech, very likely, who had not earned enough to feed himself that week - only himself, of course, he did not think anyone would be so uncharitable about his mother. Ama had her beauty and her conversation and her charm to recommend her, it was little wonder her social calendar was full up more often than not.

Perhaps it was a skewed perspective that made his mother pause in the doorway on her way out, one foot on the front step, the other still in the parlor. Dori was about to ask her to please close the door, she was letting all the hot air out, but the peculiar wistful expression on her face stoppered the words on his tongue.

“What is it?” he asked, a touch impatiently, but she only sighed.

“I sometimes worry that you’re a trifle lonesome, darling,” she said and before he could collect himself to make a proper response, closed the door and was gone into the night.

The impertinence of the remark stunned Dori into silence that did not abate until the crunching of his mother’s boots on the snow-covered stone steps faded away.

“I’m not,” he said aloud. “Of course I’m not, of all the ridiculous…”

But there was no one there to hear.

Rather than act the madman and speak to himself for the remainder of the evening - if his mother wasn’t worried about him before, she certainly would be if she returned home to find her eldest son raving at the ceiling - Dori bustled about, building up the fire and retrieved a plate of pepper biscuits from the kitchen. The wine was the finishing touch on what promised to be a very relaxing few hours.

With a blanket tucked around his legs and a pile of yarn in his lap, Dori was quite content as he took up his needles. This was precisely what he needed after a long week in the shop making simple cloth for simple people. It put bread and meat on the table, but Dori’s true love for his craft manifested when he was able to get ten minutes together for himself to weave his own creations or get a bit of knitting done. Relaxed the mind while keeping the hands busy, that was the key to bliss and if Ori got a new muffler out of it, that was an extra.

The yarn in his hands was soft, but sturdy and a lovely burgundy. Dori wasn’t sure how many washings the color would take before it began to fade, but they were living quite comfortably now and he could fret less over the few pennies more he paid for fine cloth that might not stand up to more than a few winters’ wears.

Ori destroyed his clothing at a much slower rate than Nori had done. Allowing for youthful high spirits and the fact that growing children inevitably needed new clothes before too long, he was far less callous with his things.

Then again, Dori reflected that he might be giving Nori too little credit. The yarn worked through his fingers as he counted stitches silently. Ori’s clothes, though not as fine or well made as they could be, were a good bit better than the rags Nori gamboled around the countryside in.

_“Patches on top of patches,” Dori lamented when he was very young, still unused to mending everything he owned rather than tossing aside clothes that had outlived either style or usefulness and purchasing replacements. “No wonder Men think we’re nothing but thieves and beggars.”_

_Dori was trying to thread a needle in the light of a dying fire, but his own irritation hindered him in the task just as much as the lack of light and he kept missing his mark. He was so intent upon his task that he completely missed the fact that he was not alone until a too-thin body, neck wrapped in at least two scarves, sat itself down next to him._

_“Well turned-out beggars,” Galmr said, fishing the needle that Dori dropped in surprise out of the grass. They had been apprenticed together as weavers, not particular friends then, but the trials of the road brought them closer than their shared work ever had. Galmr was not particularly handsome, with his nose like a squashed tomato, his dull brown eyes, that more of a resemblance to dirt than amber, and hair that was more the color of carrots than flame, but he had a good nature and that mattered more than good looks to Dori._

_It hadn’t always been that way and he was ashamed to recall that he sniggered behind his hands about how Galmr had a face like porridge left to sit too long. Even then, Dori was not so self-deluded that he could not admit that hardship made him wiser; it simply meant he could not afford to be as choosy as he once was._

_“Nori_ would _beg,” Dori muttered bitterly, watching his younger brother tug the young princess’s braids halfway across the camp, then nip around to her other side to steal bread off her plate. He would have been up on his feet to drag the little bratling away by his ear, but Dís was quicker than he, not to mention closer, and she swatted his hands and pulled his braids in retaliation._

_“No, he’d steal,” Galmr remarked. He watched the ruckus across the way as Dori had, but he seemed to find it funny rather than humiliating. “If little Dís let him get away with it.”_

_Dori did not reply, just made a disgruntled humming noise that could have meant anything or nothing and went back to stitching. Galmr watched him a minute, then clasped his shoulder companionably and rose._

_“Keep at it,” he encouraged. “No one ever had a better eye than you. You might not think it’s much to look at, but you work little miracles out here in the wilderness, Dori and that’s nothing to scoff at.”_

Damn, he’d dropped a stitch. Dori unraveled his last two rows of knitting and paused to take a draught from his wine glass. Scoffing was something he’d always had a knack for, both inside the Mountain and out. If he couldn’t find their situation ridiculous and degrading, the insults of the Men around them unbearable, if he himself could not sneer at their miserable accommodations, their tattered clothes and meagre meals, however was he to hold himself above it all?

Returning his attention to the would-be cowl in his hands, Dori’s mind was inexplicably drawn backward again. To a night when he could not hold himself above it all.

_It was as close to begging as he had ever come. He’d let a Man talk him down and down and down for a bolt of fabric he was selling, to less than half it’s worth and though he grit his teeth and lowered his asking price in the end it was all for naught, for he spied a ream being sold by a local merchant that he liked rather better._

_Pride bruised, ego battered, Dori gathered up his wares and left the market. It was raining that day, it kept folks away and he hadn’t earned a single penny for all the hours he stood in the wet, mud seeping in the cracks in the soles of his boots._

_Wet, dirty, and miserable he slogged back to the camp, ignoring his mother’s consoling hand on his shoulder and pulling away in mulish silence when Nori tugged at his sleeve and asked if they could play, he being back so early from the market._

_Dori shook them both off and left their awful little tent, so small and dingy it could not be called a hovel and stalked across the camp. He didn’t know where he was going until he found Galmr boiling clothes that needed laundering._

_“Everything is horrible,” he announced to Galmr’s startled face. “Everything! What did we survive for? This misery, this wandering? When does it_ end, _these trials? When does it all end?”_

_Galmr stepped toward him, a hand raising as if he was going to stroke his cheek, but Dori twisted his head away, hands clenching into fists which he hastily unclenched and shoved into his pockets._

_“I’m not crying!” he insisted, hearing not his own voice, but Nori’s petulant whinging, so he sealed his lips at once._

_“I didn’t think you were,” Galmr said hastily, but his hand rose again and Dori did not turn away. “You’ve got a smudge on your face. Here.”_

_To Dori’s mortification he found himself leaning into that touch, those warm red hands on his cheek, such a contrast to the rain that was slowly becoming sleet as it fell heavily from the dark clouds overhead. Galmr’s touch had all the feeling of a caress before he dropped his hand and wiped the smear of mud away on his trousers_

_“Thank you,” Dori said after a prolonged, embarrassed pause. He fixed his eyes on the cauldron of washing, momentarily fascinated by the way the sleet and snow melted in the steam coming off the top, gone before it came in contact the water._

The taste of pepper burning his tongue brought him back to the present with a start. Wearily, Dori set his knitting aside and passed a hand over his face, rubbing his eyes irritably. The fire was too hot he decided, moving his chair away a firm few inches. It made his eyes tired.

What a time to go wading through memories. Granted, Dori never thought any time was appropriate to go slogging through the past, it made one upset needlessly for what was done was done and nothing could change it. Besides, memory was tricky and no matter how well one’s faculties functioned, there were always gaps.

For instance, he had no idea when kindly moppings of the face and touches upon the arm turned into lingering embraces and the hesitant brushing of lips - then into embraces that were far less cautious and uncertain. He could not say when precisely he began to actively seek out Galmr’s company and he was even less sure when he realized he preferred his unremarkable eyes and ridiculous hair to anything in the world. Maybe it was the day he knitted him a long scarf and matching set of mittens when he had some excess yarn. Or when Galmr took it upon himself to assign Nori little tasks to perform to keep him occupied and useful around the camp to curtail his mischief-making.

It was remarkable, really. It was a fight to get Nori to fill a bucket from a well or stream most mornings, but Galmr had him scrubbing clothes, fetching firewood, even collecting piss pots for bleaching. Dori didn’t know how he did it, short of bribery, but Galmr was as penniless as the rest of them and had Nori tottering around, doing his bidding for no more payment than a pat on the head and a warm smile.

_“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you cursed him,” Dori remarked, not altogether kindly, one night when the two were lying side by side beneath blankets and furs, tend flaps tied firmly closed, shutting the world away. “But he continues to give me daily grief, so I’ll assume the enchantment has a limited range.”_

_A huffing laugh and light peppering of kisses along his shoulder blades was all the reply he received._

_“I know you think I’m too harsh with him, my father never would have been so,” Dori automatically explained himself, though no explanation had been asked of him. “But Nori was practically an infant when he...and, well, he had no idea how the little brat would turn out, did he? We don’t all have silver tongues that can make the most intractable youngling heed us without backtalk.”_

_Galmr paused his attentions and shifted over, laying on his stomach beside Dori, his head pillowed on his arms. “Silvertongued, am I?” he teased. “High praise, coming from you.”_

_“Oh, did I say silver?” Dori remarked, his hands rising to brush through that wiry, orange mess on Galmr’s head. It wanted oiling, badly. “Gold, might be more appropriate. I do strive for accuracy.”_

_“Flatterer.”_

_“Not really,” Dori shook his head, doing his best to arrange Galmr’s hair into a more well-kempt orange mess. “Not typically. Not when it’s undeserved. I am rather particular, you know. It’s annoying.”_

_“Sometimes,” Galmr acknowledged with a wicked grin before he shifted forward and caught Dori’s mouth, open in mock indignation, with his own. “Still, fairly endearing, mostly.”_

It wouldn’t have lasted, Dori told himself firmly, moving the chair closer to the fire since he found he was too far from it now to be quite comfortable. It shouldn’t have happened. Wouldn’t have happened, he was sure, if things remained as they were meant to, if the drake hadn’t come, if their lives hadn’t been turned upside-down.

If Smaug had not laid waste to their home and fortunes, Galmr would have remained as he was, that plain, sociable fellow who Dori greeted politely in the corridors and rolled his eyes at the moment he walked away. They would have shared nothing of importance save the little niceties of speech and manner one exchanged with acquaintances. It certainly wouldn’t have hurt quite so much when he, like so many others, was put to the pyres of Moria.

It wouldn’t have lasted, Dori said, finishing the last of his wine and rising to fetch another ladle-full from the fire. They were too different, it would have burned itself out eventually, only the flame was snuffed at its moment of greatest brilliance, leaving him in darkness, bereft of light.

It was only the _manner_ in which they were separated that sharpened the grief and left a wound within him that he thought would never scab over. If they’d gone on to the Ered Luin, something would have ended it, slowly, perhaps, a mutual acknowledgement that deriving comfort and companionship on the road was no guarantee of future happiness.

Galmr might not have had the ability to admit he wanted someone else, someone a little less _particular_. Dori would have been the one to break it off, advise him to find someone else worthy of his golden tongue since his own was barbed at the best of times. A firm handshake would have been their parting touch, or perhaps a stiff embrace a pale shadow of what was.

Quite right, Dori thought to himself as he settled back in before the fire with another glass of wine. He pulled his chair closer still; the rest of the house was deathly cold when compared with the heat before him. Once again, Dori took up his knitting, determined to keep his mind on his work, far away from visions of the past. He was far too practical to go conjuring up ghosts to haunt him. After all, he’d been looking forward to a night spent entirely on his own.

And if the flames blurred and shifted as he sat in front of the fire, their twisting configurations reminding him of untidy thick-braided coils of hair tickling his chest, well, there was no one to be troubled about it but him.


	4. Snowfall (Gróin, Sigdís, Thrór, kid!fic)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None, other than a reference to spanking.

“Wake up, lazybones! Wake up!” 

Dísa took a well-aimed swipe for the blurry figure that jumped onto bed, startling her into unwelcome wakefulness. The figure dusted itself off after it hit the floor and scurried around to the other side of the bed, jumping up and down upon the mattress.

“Come along, slowcoach! Hurry along! _Snow.”_

The word ‘snow’ got her attention as the jumping and the shouting and the waking with a face pressed far too close to her face had not. “Really? A good snow or a poor one? I’m not getting up for a frost, is it light yet?”

“Nearly!” Thrór confirmed, nodding vigorously and bouncing up and down no less forcefully than he had before. “I asked the guardswoman coming in from the night watch and _she_ said there was such an accumulation that the road to Dale would have to be cleared for foot traffic! So come _along._ Now!”

She required no further cajoling. Like a shot Dísa was out of bed, tearing off her sleeping things and re-dressing herself hurriedly in wool trousers, a quilted tunic and her warmest coat. It was too short in the arms and tight through the shoulders, she needed a new one, but no matter, it would hold out for at least one more day.

In the minds of little dwarflings, the first good snowfall of the year was in every danger of being the _last_ good snowfall of the year. No matter how many winters had come and gone, bringing with them blizzards that painted the mountain and surrounding roads a blinding white, they would ever rush out of the mountain en masse, dragging sleepy parents and caretakers out to yawn into gloved hands and wonder what the tremendous fuss was about.

Well. Some dwarflings at any rate.

“GRÓIN!” 

A head of matted black hair disappeared under a quilt as a put-upon little voice groaned, “Go _away.”_

Undeterred, Dísa and Thrór jumped on his bed and proceeded to bounce him so hard he was almost tossed off entirely. “Stop it!” Gróin demanded, giving his sister a hard pinch in the leg. “Stop it! Or I’ll scream for Ama and you won’t go out at _all_ today.”

The threat was more effective than the pinch, the pair stopped their jumping and were the picture of innocence as they sat down upon Gróin’s bed, one on either side. 

“Don’t you want to go out?” Thrór asked, astonished that anyone might want to spend even a single moment of this wonderful day abed.

“Later,” Gróin grumbled, peeking out from beneath his blanket to glare at Thrór. “How did you get in here anyway?”

“Magic!” he announced cheerfully.

Dísa was less whimsical when she replied, “He picked the lock.” 

Mouth hanging open like a fish plucked out of a river, Gróin realized an instant later that his sister had to be fibbing; Thrór wasn’t clever enough to pick locks and he confirmed this himself almost immediately. 

“I didn’t,” Thrór insisted, then clarified. “I stole one of Adad’s keys and he had to have another made by the locksmith so now there are two! I don’t know how to pick locks.”

“I wish you did,” she informed him. “Then we could get in the weapons cabinets and the training ground and all the places we’re not meant to go.”

Gróin’s expression was that of utter distaste, looking strangely at odds with his young, round face. “D’you ever stop and think there’s a _reason_ you aren’t allowed to go in those places?”

“No good one,” Dísa shook her head. “Are you coming or aren’t you?”

Being that he was quite warm and cozy in his bed, Gróin’s first instinct was to say no, he was not, and _get out._ Yet there was also the indisputable fact that he was now awake, due to the attentions of his sister and cousin and lying awake in the dark while they ran off to have fun without him was of limited appeal.

 _“Fine,”_ Gróin agreed, pushing the covers off and shoving his sister out of the way as he stomped off to get dressed. “But I’m not happy about it.”

“You’re not happy about anything ever,” Dísa replied and Thrór nodded his agreement behind her. “So that’s not - ”

“Do you have any idea what the hour is?” 

All three dwarflings froze and looked at the doorway of Gróin’s bedroom. It seemed there was no need to shout to rouse Sigríd from slumber, she was awake, wrapped in a dressing gown and looked distinctly unhappy to see them all.

“Morning?” her daughter guessed, inching closer to Thrór who did his best to hide behind her.

“Not quite,” her mother replied, not fooled for a minute by her daughter and prince’s frankly pathetic attempt at pulling the wool over eyes. “However did you come to be here, Thrór?”

Thrór knew instinctively that his explanation of ‘magic’ would go off even less successfully with Gróin’s mother than it had with Gróin himself. Wetting his lips, he cast his mind around for an explanation that did not involve theft and housebreaking, but Dísa beat him to it. 

“I let him in,” she said, which was technically not a lie. She had let him into Gróin’s room which was where they were all currently standing and quite possibly all that her mother wanted to know. “It’s _snowed_ , Ama.”

“It snows every winter just around this time, child,” Sigríd sighed, massaging the bridge of her nose. “Why the great commotion? Why so _early?”_

“We want to go out and play, missus,” Thrór replied, twisting his hands only a little guiltily behind his back.

Sigríd shook her head, “I’m sure your parents would agree that you may play later at a more reasonable hour. Now’s the time for good dwarflings to be in bed, you never know what sort of creatures lurk in fresh-fallen snow to lure deceitful children away from home.”

That silenced the children for the moment. Will-o’the-wisps and other faery folk were said to come out at night, luring little ones away with the promise of sweets and songs in woodlands, they hadn’t considered the possibility that they might hide in snowbanks as well. 

“What sort of creatures?” Gróin asked, curious and apprehensive all that once.

“All sorts,” his mother said shortly. “So you’d best behave yourself and wait until you’ve had your breakfast before you go traipsing all over the mountainside - and Thrór, you’d best take yourself back to your parents before they get to worrying where you’ve gone. Do I make myself clear?”

“Aye, missus,” Thrór said obediently and the other two nodded their agreement. Gróin was already making his way back to bed as his mother took herself back to her bedroom, closing the door behind her, but Dísa snagged him by his ankle and pulled him out again.

“What are you doing?” he asked in a loud whisper, nervous that his mother might come in again and give them a real scolding. “You heard, I’m not going to be food for faeries.”

His elder sister gave him a look of deepest skepticism. “You won’t be, faeries don’t wear hardly any clothes, they’d freeze on a day like this - anyway, you aren’t a _coward_ are you?”

Gróin was certainly not a coward, but neither was he so foolhardy that he’d ignore a command from his mother without a second thought. “No,” he scowled and Dísa gave him another tug of the arm. 

“Come on then, what if it gets hot by daylight and all the snow melts away?” she asked and Gróin found he could not argue with her logic. 

With another huff of displeasure, he crawled back out of bed and dressed himself in his warmest clothes and furred boots, tugging his cap around his ears forcefully as the three tip-toed to the door and emerged on the upstairs landing. The soles of their boots hardly made any noise at all as they walked downstairs, through the sitting room and out the door, closing it shut behind them with a barely-audible click. 

The corridors were almost totally deserted. The Mountain never slept, but some hours of the day and night aboveground were quieter than others and now it was almost ghostly quiet as they sneaked down half-lit hallways. No one stopped them or saw them and they made their way outside quite unimpeded until they came to the gate of the mountain. The huge entryway was sealed, except for the smaller doors, well-guarded, that a few dwarves used to pass in and out of the Mountain. 

“There, we can’t get out,” Gróin announced, sounding satisfied. “Let’s turn back.”

Dísa didn’t move from the place where they’d secreted themselves away, behind a huge marble pillar. “If I was to toss something heavy down the hall, they’d all get up and away to see what it was,” she mused aloud.

“Some would,” Thrór agreed. “But not so many that they’d leave the Gate unguarded. Anyway, they’d suss out where it came from and we’d be hauled back to our rooms.”

“We could make a run for it, we’re quick,” Dísa suggested, sticking her head around the side of the pillar to gauge the distance. 

Thrór seized her braid and pulled her back. “They’ve got longer legs,” he pointed out.

“Let’s go _back,”_ Gróin urged. “And come back after breakfast, when we’re _allowed.”_

Thrór favored him with a mystified look. “Where’s the fun in that?” he asked and Dísa snorted in agreement.

Gróin only frowned. Thrór and his sister had peculiar notions about what exactly constituted ‘fun,’ and not for the first time he wondered what he’d done that the Maker saddled him with the two of them as playmates. Some probably thought it was quite an honor to be a particular friend of Prince Thrór, heir of Erebor, but Gróin only thought it was a nuisance. For all the fun he’d had with the two of them, their schemes earned him not a few swats on the bottom and he was not sure that the exchange rate was quite fair to him. They were bigger and heartier than he was, after all, and bore their punishments rather better.

Suddenly, Thrór reached out and smacked Dísa hard on the shoulder. It was an action that implied he’d been struck by a _very_ good idea and she turned eagerly, asking, “What is it?”

“We don’t need to go _out_ to play,” he said excitedly. “We need to go _up.”_

“Up?” Gróin asked, intrigued despite himself. “What do you mean?”

“To the top of the mountain, where the moonstones are,” Thrór whispered, eyes shining. “It’s not guarded so well as the front gate _and_ we’ll be high up so the faeries won’t get us!”

Dísa and Thrór were already scurrying down the corridor, too far away for Gróin to remind them that faeries could _fly_. He hadn’t breath enough to scold them for their stupidity since they kept walking higher and higher up staircase after staircase until Gróin felt faintly queasy. Cold air on his face was welcome and as Thrór and Dísa dragged the door open to the outside, he found he’d completely forgotten what precisely his objections were to Thrór’s plan.

There was no lock on the door that led to the outcropping and stone circle where the moonstones were held. Nothing of importance was kept there, save the moonstones themselves, which were delicate things, easily damaged and chipped. The low, flat rocks glowed a pretty bluish-white beneath the fresh fallen snow, providing an illumination the still-dark sky did not oblige them with.

Dísa was not at all winded from her hike up the stairs. She took a flying leap onto the nearest stone shouting, “I’m King of the Mountain!” right at the moment her boots skidded on the slippery surface and she landed on her bum in the snow.

Thrór had a good long laugh at that, but she stuck her tongue out and clambered to her feet saying, “I’m _still_ King of the Mountain!” She was a trifle more careful as she put her hands on her hips and struck an heroic pose. 

“Not for long!” Thrór shouted, making himself a snowball. One of his elbows drove itself into Gróin’s side and he said, “Let’s besiege her!”

“No,” Gróin pouted, his stomach still churning dreadfully. “I don’t want to.”

Dísa kicked a pile of snow at them, and sneered, “Come on! Have at me! I’ll take you both on and win!”

Thrór threw his snowball at her, but she slid out of the way and it missed. 

“Is that the best you can do?” she taunted him, flinging a snowball of her own and getting him dead in the eyes.

Gróin edged away from the pair of them, shaking snow off his cloak and pressing his back firmly against the stone wall that surrounded the moonstones. As usual, they ignored him and went on trying get each other as wet and cold with snow as possible. The snow upon the floor was high enough to reach the tops of his boots and Gróin could feel the damp seeping into his socks with every step he took away from Thrór and Dísa and the chaos they brought with them everywhere. 

Settling in a dark little corner, Gróin squinted up at the sky overhead. Flakes fell and swirled all around, but he didn’t know if they were still falling or it was just the wind kicking flurries up. They caught the light of the stones and shimmered quite prettily, as though a hundred thousand stars were glittering above his head, or a thousand diamonds were thrown in the air all at once. 

His breath came from his mouth in puffs and clouded in front of his face before vanishing, but the loveliness around him was no consolation for the fact that his stomach hurt and he hadn’t even had any fun that would justify his catching a beating later if they were destined to catch a beating which of _course_ they were because he had no luck whatsoever and never had. 

Gróin kicked at a snowdrift, hard, and saw a glimmer of white streak across the stone. Closer inspection revealed that a chunk of one of the moonstones had broken off. As he moved along the wall to retrieve it, he realized that Thrór and Dísa had stopped shouting and were speaking to one another in hushed, worried tones.

“Did you see that?” Thrór asked.

“No,” Dísa countered immediately. Then her tone turned doubtful and she said, “Just a glimmer. It might’ve been anything.”

Crouched in the snow, the broken moonstone in hand Gróin was struck by a truly wonderful idea. A slow smile spread across his face and with a flick of his wrist, the moonstone arced through the air, brilliant and shining against the dark wall. 

With an unkingly yelp, Dísa toppled backward off the stone, landing on top of Thrór and the two were left sprawled in the snow. 

“Gróin!” she snapped as she hauled herself to her feet, dragging Thrór up with her. “Come on, we’re leaving! Where are you?”

Currently, he was crawling along the ground to take up the stone again, muffling giggles into his sleeve. 

“You don’t think…” Thrór began with growing horror, eyes wide as dinner plates, but Dísa cut him off before he could finish.

“No, I do _not_ , shut up!” she exclaimed. “Faeries would have no use for him, he’d cry and cry - ”

The wind howled around them, sending up a huge white cloud of snow, blinding the dwarflings, who shrieked with fright and jumped into each other’s arms. 

“Let’s go!” Thrór urged her. “Let’s get out of here!”

“No!” Dísa shook him off. “Not without Gróin, we can’t leave him!”

“What if there’s naught to _leave?”_ Thrór asked, shivering as much with fear as with cold. “What if he’s gone already - what if they’re coming for _us_ next?”

Gróin couldn’t help it, he really couldn’t. Creeping slowly closer and closer, he laughed out loud, a high-pitched sound that he stifled as quickly as he could. It had the desired effect, though, Thrór and Dísa shouted again, the former stumbling to the door, the latter holding her ground and shouting, “YOU STUPID FAERIES LET MY BROTHER GO, DO YOU HEAR ME? OR I’LL RIP YOUR WINGS RIGHT OFF!”

Another whistle of wind made her jump and Gróin saw his chance to _really_ get them. Throwing the little stone shard, he leapt onto the stone Dísa claimed as King of the Mountain, shrieking loudly enough to wake the dead.

The other two dwarflings screamed and ran for the door at the same time, knocking into each other and slamming their heads hard together, exchanging their shouts of alarm for yelps of pain. In their panic and confusion, it took a few seconds for them to discern the sound of Gróin laughing from his perch on the moonstone. 

“Ooh!” he crowed with deepest delight. “Ooh, I fooled you! I got you, the looks on your _faces!”_

Dísa’s eyes flashed dangerously and Thrór had to tackle her to the ground to stop her from throwing herself on her brother and pounding the stuffing out of him. 

“Let me up!” she howled, thrashing around beneath Thrór who did his best to hang on and now allow himself to be bucked off. “I’ll show him who’s got who - ”

Force of habit, but Gróin jumped off the stone and ran far away, hiding behind the farthest moonstone as Thrór tried to cool his sister’s wrath. 

“You were just threatening faeries for him!” he reminded her and grabbed one of her flailing fists. “It was only a joke, you’re just sore ‘cos he got you for once - ow! Don’t _bite,_ Dísa!”

The role of peacebroker was abandoned then, Thrór grabbed a handful of snow and shoved it in his friend’s face. Dísa managed to grab the front of his coat and flipped him over onto the ground, her cap falling off allowing hair to escape from her braid and fall into her eyes. Thrór took advantage of her momentary blindness and got a hand free so he could punch her in the stomach. The two of them were still rolling around on the ground as Gróin sneaked quietly behind them to the door and crept down the stairs, doubled over in hysterics. 

About halfway down, he heard the sound of heavy footfalls rapidly ascending the staircase and he instinctively hid himself away behind a column on one of the landings, clapping a hand over his mouth. Not a moment too soon either - for his _father_ was coming up the stairs at top speed, flanked by two fellow guardsman. He had the night watch, Gróin remembered, watching his tall form disappear up the stairs. 

Should he turn back? Turn himself in? Dísa and Thrór were going to get it for sure. And she _had_ said she was going to rip the wings off faeries for him…

Self-preservation won out in the end. After a few seconds’ hesitation on the landing, Gróin legged it down the stairs, running to his family’s rooms as fast as his feet would carry him. More dwarves were out and about now, but he tried to be as sneaky as possible. They had not bothered locking the door to their apartments when they left and it was still open now. Quickly and quietly as he could manage, Gróin slipped back inside, pulling his boots off and carrying them so they would not leave wet footprints all over the floor. 

The door of his parents’ bedroom was closed still and once he’d tip-toed by it, he hurtled his way over the threshold of his own room and shut the door silently. In a flurry of activity, he divested himself of coat, cloak, mittens, socks and trousers, shoving the lot beneath his bed for the servants to find later. Once he’d donned his sleeping things again he got straight under the covers, clutching his stuffed fox to his chest, its bushy tail winding around his wrist as he attempted to slow his rapid breathing.

All that effort was for naught, his heart thudded skittishly at the sound of the apartment door opening and father’s voice thundered out, loud even through stone. “...and you’re not to see Thrór for the rest of the day - for the rest of the _week!_ Do you understand me?”

“It’s all Gróin’s fault!” Dísa objected. “No one would’ve heard a thing if he hadn’t started us screaming!”

“Sigdís, it’ll be _two_ weeks if you keep on telling me lies!”

“It’s not a _lie_ he was there and pretended to be a faery to frighten us!”

Farin made disgruntled noise in the back of his throat, “Is that so? And tell me, how is your brother meant to have been in two places at once? ‘less you expect me to believe that he _is_ part faery?”

“He’s not a faery!” Dísa shouted. “He’s a little goblin-sneak, that’s what he is! He was _there_ , Ada, I swear!”

The door of Gróin’s room swung open and the lad himself squeezed his eyes shut tight, going still as stone beneath his blankets. Dísa exploded.

“Oh, _you!”_ she howled; she was so loud Gróin could not pretend to sleep through it. He sat up and saw her tucked under one of their father’s arms like a parcel, but she managed to free one of her arms and waved her fist menacingly at him. “I’ll get you! Just you wait, I’ll get you back, you - ”

Whatever words she spoke next were muffled by their father’s hand going over her mouth. 

“Safe as a vault,” he nodded, satisfied. “Back to sleep with you, lad - snowed last night, if you’re of a mind to, once I’ve slept a few hours, I’ll take you out for a few turns down the hill on a sledge. _Just_ you, mind, I only pass my free time with honest dwarflings.”

Dísa’s wailing was piercing, even behind a broad hand and Gróin grinned hugely at Farin, nodding as his sister was dragged out of his room kicking and screaming. Once she was gone, he managed to drift off, buoyed by the thought of spending a rare afternoon alone with his father. Already this day was turning out to be the best first snowfall he’d had in ages.


	5. Tradition (Thráin, Freya, newlyweds in a hot tub)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audience, maybe PG for smooches and nude caresses? **Warnings:** Thráin has Seasonal Affective Disorder, though no one calls it that. And he and his lawful wife are nekkid in a hot tub, so avert your eyes if wet dwarves aren't your thing.

Two instances one year apart did not a tradition make, but what more could one expect after a single year of marriage? Freya was optimistic, anyway, and so decided that if her and Thráin’s yearly excursion to the baths was not yet a tradition that she would make it into one through sheer determination.

Honestly, it would do her husband good, she thought, if he took in a hot soak and a massage at least once a month, if not oftener, but it was like pulling teeth to get him to accompany her once in a twelvemonth, so she was not holding her breath on that account. Thráin _bathed_ of course, she wouldn’t have agreed to marry him if he refused a scrub when he needed one, but the baths of Erebor were not intended merely for ridding one of filth, but also ridding one of cares, at least for a little while. 

Ostensibly public, it took only a request from the newly crowned Princess to secure the best facilities for their private use for a few hours. The crowds, she concluded, put Thráin off. Unless he was around family or close friends he either sat in solemn silence or else only talked matters about matters of war, work, and court - precisely the sort of heavy chatter that made muscles tense and brows furrow in the relaxing heat and steam, it ran utterly contrary to their purpose.

Odd, for a dwarf to prefer his own company, or that of a small group, to the riotous noise and clamor of their shared spaces, but Thráin, Freya was quickly learning, was far from typical. 

Even now, enveloped to the chest in warm, lightly scented water, she could see the tell-tale furrow between his brows that bespoke a frown. Unable to bear it a moment longer, she moved from her own marble seat beside him and sat astride his lap, their unbound beards tangling in the water, light and dark. Without a word she kissed his lips until she felt them relax as he kissed her back with less enthusiasm than she liked.

Freya pulled away and favored her husband with a frown of her own. “What’s wrong?” she asked bluntly.

Thráin’s large hands settled on her hips, lightly tracing her smooth skin beneath the water. 

“I don’t know,” he sighed - he was forever sighing, he had sighs for every occasion, even _happy_ sighs, which nevertheless carried an air of foreboding. “The season.”

This time it was Freya’s brow that furrowed. 

“The season?” she asked, confused. “Durin’s Day’s tomorrow unless you’ve forgotten. The feast tonight, the bonfires, the food, all the rest...and that makes you melancholy?”

Thráin’s broad shoulders lifted in a shrug, “Evidently.”

“You weren’t so last year,” Freya pointed out, hoping to lift her husband’s bad mood through sheer logic.

She managed to coax a smile out of him, albeit an ironic little thing that was gone almost as fast as it came on, “Last year, as you’ll recall, I was made stupid on potions and merely grateful to be alive.”

The crater in his face where his eye once was, interrupting the smooth braid of his warrior’s tattoos with scars could not be missed. Freya lowered her head and kissed it, not caring to be gentle because she knew it didn’t hurt anymore. “And you’re not grateful anymore?”

“Don’t be - ” Thráin began, then stopped himself and reconsidered his words. “Of _course_ I am.” This time it was he who tilted his chin up and captured her lips against his own and now the kiss had all the fervor Freya preferred from her husband.

Her arms went around his neck as she pressed closer to him, then stopped and pulled back, hands clasped loosely at the back of his neck under his wet hair. 

“You’re in knots, all over,” she said, stroking his shoulders. “That’s a year’s worth of worry built up. I keep telling you if you’d only - ”

“Aye, I know,” he replied shortly and Freya wanted to shoot back, _If you know so much, why do you never heed my advice?_ but she kept her thoughts in her head and her tongue in her mouth and kneaded at Thráin’s tense muscles.

“Isn’t that what we’re here for? Aren’t you being a little premature?” he asked, but he did not move away nor did he try to displace her. 

Freya laughed shortly. “Not at all,” she said, sliding off of Thráin, bidding him turn to the side so she could have better access to the muscles of his back. “You’re so tense the masseurs will be at it for hours if I don’t do half the job for them. You’ll miss the bonfires, they’ll be all burned out by the time you’re ready to come out. You work too hard.”

“No such thing,” Thráin replied. “What am I, a Man that I need to sleep the day away once a sennight?”

“No,” Freya rolled her eyes, digging her fingers into Thráin’s hard muscles forcefully. “I don’t mean that you must put work aside...only...I don’t know how to explain it.”

“Then what are you scolding me for?” he asked, the threat of a whinge in his tone.

This time Freya drove her fingers in as hard as she could, earning a noise of discomfort from her husband, then the satisfaction of feeling his shoulders _finally_ relax. Freya could not put into words what it was about her husband’s work ethic - admirable by the standards of their people - that struck her as being odd. Perhaps it was the way he seemed to derive no pleasure from it. 

A day at court made him irritable and waspish. Once he was through in the forge, no matter how well the blades he crafted turned out, he wasn’t sanguine until he’d had a thorough scrubbing to wash the soot from his face and scour the black from beneath his fingernails. Time spent among family and friends generally went well, but if the crowd became too large - and Thráin’s definition of “too large” changed with the hour, it seemed - he’d sink into himself, go quiet where before he teased and joked with the rest of them.

Moments like this, the two of them alone together were rare, usually stolen in the few minutes between waking and sleeping at night. Too few to spoil with fighting, Freya decided and swallowed down her complaints, kissing Thráin’s temple. 

Thráin tugged at her arms until they were around his neck and he leaned back, his head pillowed on her shoulder. 

“I’m sorry I disappoint you so terribly,” he said, his remaining eye fixed upon the mosaics that decorated the walls.

“You don’t - it’s not _me_ who I’m worried about,” Freya replied, employing all her willpower not to snap at him. “You...you never seem happy. Sometimes I think there’s nothing in the world that makes you happy.”

Thráin shifted his gaze up to look at his wife and grasped her right hand, kissing her palm softly. “You make me happy,” he said firmly. 

Freya tried very hard not to doubt his words. Other Dwarves lived lives of contentment, dotted here and there with moments of sorrow, anger, heartbreak. Thráin, it seemed, lived a life of sorrow, brightened by solitary joys that were long in coming and did not linger. 

“You never smile,” Freya observed; it was only a small exaggeration. A shrug rolled Thráin’s shoulders and she held on tighter to him. 

“It’s not a habit of mine,” he said flatly. “My father smiles enough for the both of us, my mother laughs loudly enough for the both of us...well, that’s what they’ve always said, at any rate. And Óin’s called me, ‘that miserable bastard,’ as long as he’s been old enough to curse without his mother boxing his ears for it. I don’t find...pleasure easily. I never have.”

Freya carded her fingers through his wet hair, heart sinking like a stone in her chest, “Not even with your wife?”

Thráin smiled. 

“It’s as I said,” he replied, sitting her up and drawing her back onto his lap again, hiding his smile against her neck as he peppered her skin with kisses hot as the water around them. “You make me very happy.”

As Freya’s wet hands stroked her husband’s shoulders she imagined that they felt marginally less knotted, that he was the tiniest bit more relaxed. It was a small triumph, but she counted the evening as a success. 

_If only,_ she lamented in her thoughts as she claimed her husband’s mouth with her own, _this was more than an annual tradition._


	6. Bells (Dís, Dwarf v. Man culture)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** PG **Warnings:** Ableism, disabled veteran, blindness, homelessness, begging. This is not a happy story, though I like to think it ends on a hopeful note.
> 
> The inspiration for this story came to me months ago when I was listening to "Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye," I got to contemplating the difference between the Dwarven and Mannish treatment of disabled veterans, went on a Tumblr rant and it finally came together in this story.

Dís certainly missed her brother, no doubt, but there was a delicious freedom in being permitted to travel miles and miles without him constantly keeping one eye on her. It was her due, finally having come of age a year ago, she was full grown now and the maker of her own destiny. She could kick her pony’s sides and go galloping straight across the continent, if she was of a mind to, or South, where it was warm all the year through, everyone wore beautiful silks, and the air smelled of spices. 

A sharp whistle brought her back to reality. 

“Dismount,” Dwalin said shortly, hopping off his own pony and leading it by the bridle to a paddock off the main road. 

Dís followed his instructions with only a small frown. Adult though she might be, a legally autonomous dwarrowdam who could sign contracts and take herself wherever she wanted to go, she still had some ties holding her back. Duty, family, and finances - finances being chief among them and why she’d left the Ered Luin in the first place.

Every autumn, a month or two before Durin’s Day, a caravan from the Blue Mountains ventured south to the valleys and softly rolling hills where they could sell their wares and ply their trades and buy new wares in a different market than they were accustomed to. It was a profitable way to make some extra coin at harvest time in the north, a good way to store up supplies and money for the winter. 

Ordinarily, Dís would still be at home, minding the forge all by herself - truthfully, spending less time minding the forge than she did lingering over the counter beneath the awning, chatting away with Hervor while her brother and cousin were gone and there was no one to complain about her wasting time. This year, she and her brother switched roles because (for once) she was deemed the more responsible of the two of them, or at least the more level-headed.

Not that Thorin phrased it in exactly those terms. Instead he waffled on about duty and experience and knowing all aspects of one’s trade, how it would be a trial run and if she comported herself well, maybe she could make the trip _next_ year since she got so little work done when she was left to her own devices and he was very well aware that she took Hervor on as an apprentice in the art of gossip while he was gone and he wasn’t hewn from the rock _yesterday_ , lass…

The prattle continued on in that manner for some time, Dís nodding all the while, then when Thorin paused for breath she grinned wickedly and said, “Oh, aye. And knowing when to keep my fists to myself doesn’t have aught to do with it, I suppose?”

“No,” Thorin said shortly. “Not a thing.”

The year previous Thorin caused quite a stir laying flat a Man who insulted their race and their crafts. The way Dwalin told it, he’d come up to them looking for a fight and got more than he bargained for, but exactly what he deserved. The way Balin told it, Thorin ought to have kept a tight reign on his temper and let the matter go for the sake of their reputation in the region. If a Man walked around spewing lies about the threat of violent, greedy dwarves and one of their number proceeded to knock his teeth from his mouth, well, that certainly didn’t go very far to proving the Man a liar, did it?

In any case, she swore up and down that she would be on her absolute, best behavior for the duration. For Thorin’s peace of mind, of course, not because there was any chance _she_ would be drawn into a temper-fueled brawl. Dís liked to consider herself far too sensible for that sort of thing. 

Anyway, she was keeping merry company, guaranteed to keep her spirits up. Bofur and Bombur abandoned the mines temporarily to come and ply their sometime trade as toymakers. In truth, it was Bifur’s wares that were guaranteed to make the best profit, his skill was far beyond theirs and his eye for detail extraordinary. 

The little clockwork horse he put the finishing touches on during their journey south was truly ingenious, the key that wound it was cleverly hidden in its tail and when it was wound, it walked the full length of the floor in his apartment, even dipping its head and tossing its mane. If Dís didn’t know better, she would swear the thing was about to whinney every time it started up. 

Bifur was along as well, though he did not expect to do any selling, unless it was to their own people, in private. Unable to speak the Common Tongue, he rarely spoke aloud in mixed company and the clumsy hands of Men could not render iglishmek - nor was any Dwarf worth his beard keen on teaching their language to outsiders. 

Once their horses were fenced in and the fee for their stabling and food paid up front, Dís and Dwalin doubled back to help unload tents, wares and supplies from the wagon. 

“What had you so distracted?” he asked favoring her with a fond smile. “I thought you were about to keep on to the next town.”

“Thought about it,” she teased him, then grinned. “Then I figured I’d better not, you’d be lonesome without me.”

“Not for long,” Dwalin replied quickly. “For Thorin’d kill me if I lost you, which is reason enough to keep you close and with a sharp eye out for your mischief.”

 _“My_ mischief? That’s fine talk coming from a fellow who stood back and cheered while my brother - what’s that?”

There was a sound coming up the hill, a cheerful jingling that was so different from the shuffling of boots, the snorts of horses and shouts for assistance with unloading the wagons that it could not help but catch her ear. Dwalin cocked his head and listened, squinting over the horizon. What he saw made him wipe any trace of a smile off his face.

It was a Man, an old Man from the look of him, bent and hobbling up the road with a cane tied with two dented bells. Despite the oncoming cold, he was wrapped only in a threadbare old cloak and dressed in little more than rags. 

“A beggar,” Dwalin announced sourly, but it was hardly necessary, Dís knew what a beggar was, had seen them before in their travels and was nearly reduced to begging more times than she remembered. “Steady on, no gawping, let’s make ourselves useful.” 

The next few days were so busy that Dís forgot all about the Man with the bells, until she saw him, sitting on the roadside, a wooden bowl beside him. Unlike other beggars he did not plead with or attempt to charm passers-by. He just sat, quietly mumbling his thanks when a penny or two dropped into the cup. One of his hands was curled around his stick beside him, but the bells were silent.

She couldn’t help; she stared. She knew she was gawking and looked away the moment that the Man lifted his face and seemed to look right at her. How must she seem to him? A dwarf dressed, if not well, at least in clothes that were clean, with employment, an occupation, an honest living. When times were thin, Men’s hearts were hardest, she well remembered. Would he curse her? Would his cursing rouse the tepid good will of the village against them.

Already she’d heard muttered remembrances of the ‘vicious dwarf from last autumn,’ so she smiled her brightest and employed her sweetest manners to recommend simple knives to Men and Women, as she’d been taught. To the Men, she spoke of their ability to protect or harm, to hide sheathed in inner pockets or worn at the belt. To Women, she spoke about how easy they made cooking, cutting through the most stubborn turnip as if it was a pat of butter, as useful for skinning rabbits as they were for deboning chickens. 

So far, her charm had served her well, but if that beggar, out of spite or orneriness raised up a mob against them, she was quite certain that none of the Dwarven Clans would be doing business in this little patch of the West for a long while. 

Chancing another glance over, Dís was ashamed at the relief she felt bubbling up inside her when she saw the thin strip of cloth tied over his eyes; he was blind and no matter to him if Dwarves were about. 

Deeper than the shame was a heady rush of nostalgia, a sense that she’d been there before. For how many times had her father begrudgingly donned an eyepatch to save the delicate sensibility of the Men around him who found the sight of his ruined left eye disturbing? When Dís was tiny she used to run her pudgy little hands over the scar tissue, probably because she liked feeling the texture of the ridges. 

A memory surfaced, one of the few she carried with her from the time before the dragon; one of the few in which she could remember her father smiling. 

He had been lying down on the floor before the fire in their rooms. Dís sat on his chest, one of his hands steady against her back so she did not topple off. Though she had seen them a thousand times before, she found herself fascinated by the tattoos upon his brow and nose and she traced them as well as she could with her clumsy fingers, her father wriggled his brow to make them move and jump so that she would laugh. 

It pulled at the thick scar tissue strangely and for a moment Dís stared, fascinated, then asked in a concerned voice, _“Da hurt?”_

He laughed, and sat up to kiss her. _“Nah,”_ he said as she burrowed her face into his beard. _“Not for a long while.”_

Dís was almost overcome; she felt her throat tighten and tears sting at her eyes. She hardly ever thought of her father, if she could help it. Strange that the good memories should hurt so much more deeply than the bad.

“Here,” Dwalin approached her with a tin cup of small beer.

Shaking her head, Dís moved away a little begging off the offering with, “I’m not thirsty.”

“Not you, but he is, probably. You can’t drink copper.” Dwalin’s brown eyes were fixed not on her, but the beggar across the way. A muscle tightened in his face and he seemed affected, though by anger or pity, Dís could not quite tell. “Go on. I’ll mind the stall, even if I’m not so cheery as you.”

Wordlessly, Dís accepted the cup with a nod, heart fluttering a little as she made her way toward the Man. Her footsteps were loud enough without an extra effort to make them more audible, but she took care to make noise enough that he would no someone was approaching. Even so, he might still tell her to bugger off when he learned she hadn’t any coins to give her, just watery beer. 

The closer she got, the more she could discern about him. The cloth tied around his face obscured most of his features above the nose, save an inch-wide strip of peeling, sunburned skin, but Dís realized quickly that he was nowhere near as old as she thought. Quite young, in fact, beneath his scars, pockmarks and tatters. 

“Excuse me,” she said hesitantly when he turned his face on instinct in her direction. It moved the staff and the bells scraped against one another, the sound harsh and unpleasant. “I’ve summat for you to drink, if you’ll have it.”

To her relief, the Man smiled; he was missing a few teeth, but it was a gold-bright smile regardless. “Thank’ee, ma’am,” he said, extending a hand gratefully. “The day is warm for harvesttime.”

“It is a bit,” she agreed, pressing the tin into his palm. “But the nights are cool enough.”

“So they are,” he nodded before tipping the mug back and drinking. At first it seemed he intended to finish the whole thing off in one swallow, but he took only a few shallow sips before he lowered his cup. “Do you hail from this village or have you come for the trading? With your husband, I assume.”

Dís couldn’t help herself, she snorted at the notion thought. 

“I haven’t a husband,” she said, thoughts flickering briefly to shining yellow braids and a hearty laugh. “But I am here for the trading with my kin.”

“You’ll have to forgive me,” he said, inclining his head respectfully as he took another draught from his mug. “I mistook your age.”

“No bother,” Dís replied with a grin he could not see, but probably heard all the same. “Happens all the time. Do you...is this place your home?”

The Man’s smile faded a little. 

“Ah, no,” he said, shaking his head sadly and drinking again. “My family lives several miles hence, I believe, going southerly. It has been…some time since I’ve been in their company. The ways can be dark and treacherous for one who must rely so much on the kindness of strangers - you have proved yourself most kind, both in your giving of drink and your generosity of conversation. I thank you.”

“Little matter, you’re welcome to both,” Dís stared at him again, wondering how he could be in such a state if his family was not so far away. His speech was learned, at least learned enough that she supposed there must have been money put aside for his schooling. Why educate someone up only to abandon them? “How did you come to be here? If you don’t mind my asking - if you do, say so. I won’t be offended. Mine are a people who value straight talk.”

“It is a long tale,” the Man said with a weariness his years alone could not account for. “I wouldn’t want to keep you.”

A glance over her shoulder revealed Dwalin counting out coins with a dwarrow merchant; he seemed to be doing just fine without her cheer. Dís felt in her pockets for something more substantial than a cup of the small, immediately ignoring a cake of cram. Even Dwarves detested the stuff and it would probably crack the rest of the poor Man’s teeth if she offered it to him. The oat cake she stole away from breakfast would have to do.

“I’ve nowhere to be, not urgently,” she said, holding the cake out. “I’ve an oatcake, just beside your right hand. Take it, consider it payment for the tale.”

The Man did not hesitate in snatching it up, though his thin lips drew up and he seemed ashamed at his own conduct. “Very well,” he nodded, biting off a tiny corner of the cake. “It’s a fine price for a sad story.”

Sad it was indeed and Dís stood by, mouth agape as it went on. The Man - whose name was Alric - had been raised, as she expected, by gentlefolk. His father was the village schoolmaster and expected his second son to go in for the clergy, whether he wanted to or not.

“It would have been a respectable living,” Alric remarked wistfully. “Quiet and steady if I found a position. A little house, a wife, perhaps children. Quiet and comfortable, but I wanted more than the life my parents picked out for me. I’d filled my heads with adventure stories and when the soldiers came through the village looking for volunteers, I jumped at the chance. For an adventure of my own.”

Dís knew what came next, it was an old story, even for her people. A young, bold, green warrior leaps into the fray only to find himself overwhelmed, struck down, out of the battle before the end of the first charge. Usually the cocky warrior would recover from his wounds and go on to fight another day, wiser, more apt to listen to his Masters, but then Dwarves were a hardy people. The wounds they considered trifles could devastate a Man. 

“I thought - when I _could_ think - that I was going to die,” he said dully, the beer and food forgotten, hanging limply from his hands. “One might have thought I would wish for it, then, knowing that I would never be...as I was. But I did not. I only wanted to live, for _what_ I did not know, but I clung to life with all that was within me.”

“Of course,” Dís said softly. She did not know what, if anything, awaited Men in the hereafter, but she had known many a dwarf, grievously injured in war who held on through pain and recovery though they were assured a place in the Halls of Waiting. It might have been easier to let go, give up, but theirs was a race of fighters, to the very last. 

Alric did not seem to hear her. “When I woke to...it is difficult to explain...more and _less_ than darkness, I thought for a moment I had died, but I suspecting dying hurt rather less than I did at that time. And when I could walk again, or at least take myself to my feet and hobble, I was sent on my way.”

Dís nodded, then remembered he could not see her and asked, “Just...sent away? With no...employment, no aid?”

“Another soldier offered to see me home. I refused him.” Alric ran a hand through his greasy hair, flipping it back, away from his brow, “It was pride or shame or...I couldn’t do it, bring myself to go back when I would only be a burden - I’m sure they’d hardly know me now and at any rate, the overseers of the poor are hard-hearted. No sooner would I return to my village, but he’d surely find some way to shoo me off somewhere else.” 

Alric took a breath, a pause to gain mastery of himself and his emotions before he continued doggedly, “I had a pipe when I left, a fife, but it’s long gone now. Sometimes I think, if I could save money, buy another, that would be _something_ , but I must rely on nothing more than pity to stir people’s generosity and pity is worth very little in this world.”

A crooked smile lit his face briefly and made him look boyish as he added, “Though today it has bought me very fine company indeed and I thank you for letting me bend your ear, my maid.”

“It wasn’t pity,” Dís said immediately. “Not...to be very honest, you reminded me of my father. And he was not one to be pitied, he...was injured, badly when he was young. But he came home all the same.”

Alric went very still, remembering the food in his hand and finishing off the oat cake. “Indeed. Your mother - never mind, that was impertinent.”

“No, say what you would,” Dís urged. “I insist.”

“How did your mother receive him?”

It was so long ago, Thorin was not yet born, but she had heard the story so many times Dís often felt that she might as well have been there. “She ran into the room where he was kept for healing, just barged in, although she wasn’t meant to be there. She wouldn’t leave his side and stayed by him all the while. They were married as soon as they could be, not even a month after.” 

Alric smiled. It was a sickly thing, quickly gone, but it was a smile. 

“How very lovely. Thank you for telling me that, it is a thought that will warm me on cold nights. Now,” he handed the cup out to her, “I’ve taken up a great deal of your time and drinking vessels. Thank you, and I do hope our paths will cross again, before you and your kinfolk take your leave of this place.”

“Stands to reason,” Dís said as she took the cup back. “It’s not a very big market.”

“Well, then until next time Miss...I am sorry, did you give me your name?”

She had not. She would not. And so she only said, “I’m called Dís,” before she hurried back to their stall.

Dís was quiet as some of her fellows talked about their respective market days around the supper fire. It was no surprise whatever that Bofur’s retelling was full of enthusiasm for his cousin’s talent at wood carving and well-deserved enthusiasm it was too. They’d half sold out of the toys they’d brought with them and Bifur sat, half turned away from the fire, his stewed mushrooms untouched as he set to carving.

“Bad day,” Bombur whispered to Dís when he took her bowl to refill it. “Headache, I think.”

Dís nodded and sopped up the thick gravy at the bottom of the bowl with crusty bread. Stood to reason Alric had bad days, who fed him up, gave him some occupation for idle hands? It was not her custom to wring her heart out over Men, but this one didn’t seem to have a soul in the world who cared about him. Not for the first time that day she wondered what his family thought of them, if they thought of him. Did they believe him dead? Or did they wake up every morning hoping to hear a familiar rap on the door?

Or, her stomach dropped to her bowels when she thought if it, had they washed their hands of him when he left home?

“Stew’s good,” she commented idly, drawing a smile from Bombur.

“Thanks,” he replied, helping himself to the last of it. “Thyme’s what does it. And good for courage, so’s I hear tell.”

Dwalin snorted and set his empty bowl aside, removing a pouch of pipeweed from an inner pocket of his jerkin. “Not much cause for courage here, it’s a soft country.”

“Not for the countryside!” Bofur exclaimed as if Dwalin had just refuted the obvious. “The marketplace! Slavering wolfpups all the wee ones what come running up the stall, hollering and jumping. Nearly had to fight them off with sticks! I’d rather face down a pack of orcs than hoards of children, they’re _twice_ as deadly!”

Dís chuckled lowly and Bofur’s grin widened. “Aha! And there’s me lass once more, what’s had you looking so downcast all evening? Don’t think I didn’t spy you charming them Men and Women what come by - when I wasn’t in danger o’being gobbled up by vicious children, I mean.’

“She did a kindness,” Dwalin replied when Dís said nothing. He’d kept one eye her all day, her melancholy made him uneasy. “Brought a cup of small ale to the beggar on the side of the road and it’s been lying ill with her ever since. You were gone a while, what’d that Man have to tell you that troubled you so?”

Dís caught the hint of threat beneath Dwalin’s words and she shot him a warning look. “It’s not what you think. _He_ wasn’t a trouble at all, just...his situation. He was a soldier, a battle took his sight and strength and he hasn’t any employment nor anyone who’ll help him.”

Glóin choked on his mouthful of smoke while Óin patted his back and looked grim. “What?” he asked, when he had breath again. _“No one?_ Were all his shieldbrothers slaughtered? His captains?”

Shrugging helplessly Dís replied, “I don’t know, likely not. They paid him enough mind after the battle to keep him alive and then sent him away, no matter what happens after. He said one of his fellow soldiers offered to bring him to his family, but he refused. I - I think he was worried they’d not want him.”

“Not want him?” Now it was Bofur’s turn to splutter, though he looked merely heartbroken, not indignant. “That’s...that’s...no one could turn their back on their kin what’s gone and done something valiant? Even if he’d done something daft or wicked, kin’s kin, eh?”

Again, Dís shrugged, certain that she would never understand the minds and customs of Men.

“Disgraceful,” Balin shook his head sadly, but there was a bite of anger to his words as well. “I’ve heard of such treatment before. I always thought Men, living so briefly, would treat their fellows with more respect and consideration, and weakness and infirmity should have no bearing on it.”

Balin did not need to speak aloud what all of their company knew: No Dwarf would behave in such a way. Not to one of their own race who was injured in the service of his liege-lord. Medical attention, treatment and, if necessary, a pension for one who could not work consistently enough to earn his own living. It was a great mark of shame upon a family’s honor not to welcome home a kinsman hurt in wartime, any kingdom that did not set aside adequate provisions for its wounded warriors would suffer the scorn of the rest of their race the world over. Yet this was not the practice among Men. 

“Likely because there are so many and they fall so easily,” Óin speculated to some nods and a few distressed glances. Only Dwalin did not look up, his face still in the flickering firelight. “One wretch among millions, well, that’s no great concern of theirs. If he was from a great family, perhaps his situation might be different, but as it is - ”

“Don’t make sages of us,” Dwalin spoke over Óin, rising from his place from the fire in agitation. “A damn sight more honorable than Men, aye, but not perfect. And not every warrior who comes off worse in a battle’s taken care of as carefully as you’d have it.”

Óin looked Dwalin up and down closely, taken aback by his caustic tone, “What’s got into you, laddie?”

“Lot of hot air,” he muttered, handing Dís his pipe and stomping away from the fire into the surrounding darkness. “I’m taking a walk.” 

A stretch of uncomfortable silence followed before Óin let out a huff and looked at Balin expectantly, “Well? Aren’t you going to nab the lad before he goes off and does something fool-headed?”

Balin raised an eyebrow at his cousin, “He’ll come back sooner or later, no need to fret about him.”

“I’m not fretting,” Óin spat, folding his arms moodily. _“I_ don’t want to be driven out of town when he gets into a brawl with some skinny Man with a big mouth just because _he’s_ having a fit of temper. Two years in a row is two years too many.”

“It was Thorin last year,” Dís offered quietly, but Óin only snorted and shook his head again.

“Thorin, Dwalin, what’s it matter who’s done it if the outcome’s the same? I don’t mind telling you, those two hotheads have been a pain in my backside for over a century now and _furthermore_ \- ” 

**”Animals.”**

Everyone looked up at that and Óin stopped ranting; it was the first word Bifur had spoken all night.

“What?” Bofur asked, gesturing vaguely in the direction of the paddock nearby. “The horses? You’re worried ‘bout the horses?”

 _Men,_ Bifur signed, half turned away from them.The axe cast a long black shadow over his face. _Abandon their sick. Injured. They leave to die. Animals, no better._

A contemplative silence followed Bifur’s uncharacteristically harsh judgment upon the race of Men. Despite his injury he rarely seemed less than content, optimistic even. Bifur bore no grudges, had no enemies. Dís knew Thorin was in awe of him, this dwarf who had drunk his fill of suffering, but was still kind, smiled despite it all. He admired him.

Yet Bifur had his family. Though he could not speak the Common Tongue he made himself understood among his fellow creatures and, perhaps most important, he could work and work the craft he was Made for. The toys he made were a marvel of art and ingenuity. Long-lasting, despite how rough dwarflings and the children of Men could be in their games. 

What if he didn’t have any of that? What if, in their poverty, Bofur and Bombur could not afford another mouth to provide for between the two of them? They might love him, but love could not feed or clothe or house a body. And if it had been his hands that were damaged instead of his head?

It was not something much spoken off, but dwarves who lost the use of their hands through accident or warfare or brutal punishment did not tend to live long afterward. Dwalin was right, Dís realized coldly, sucking in a lungful of the strong pipeweed he favored. They were not perfect. 

No one spoke much after that. When the weed in their pipes had burned to ash, they bid one another quiet good-nights and made their way back to their tents and their bedrolls. Dís was sharing with Balin and Dwalin, despite her troubled mind she fell asleep almost as soon as her head lay itself down. Dwalin was not back yet and as her eyes closed, she saw Balin was sitting up near the tent flaps, waiting for him.

The remaining fortnight of trade went as well as it could have gone. New connections were made between dwarves of other Clans from other regions and all of their race managed to avoid engaging in any serious scuffles with the local Men. Dís scanned the road on her way to and from the market, but she saw no sign of Alric nor heard the bells that hung from his walking stick.

“Could be he was run out of town,” Dwalin said, not cruelly, merely factually as they were packing the wagons to return to the Ered Luin. “It’s not uncommon, ‘specially in little places like this. No proper asylum and no money to provide for the poor. And on market days the guards like to drive ‘em out, thinking they’re an eyesore.”

“I know,” Dís said and of course she did. 

How many times had they been questioned, her grandfather made to patiently answer question after question about what their business was passing through, how long did they mean to stay, if they were to make camp on the edge of the village they must do so with the full understanding that they were to provide their own food, kindling and if there was even a _whisper_ of trouble, it would have been better for them if they passed by the town entirely. 

The wagons were nearly all packed when Bofur came jogging up to her and pulled on the back of her braid to get her attention.

“Ow!” Dís exclaimed, landing a solid punch on his upper arm that had him wincing.

“I called your name,” he explained, rubbing feeling back into the limb. “You didn’t answer, you was miles away - anyhow, you seen that blind fellow about? Only I got something for him, to ease his way a bit.”

From behind his back he produced a wooden flute, simply carved, without embellishment, but smooth to the touch, carefully sanded down.

“This isn’t yours,” Dís observed.

“Nah,” Bofur said. “Don’t reckon as Dwarven flutes are a good fit for Mannish hands, eh? Bifur carved it, spent the better part o’the last week working on it. Fine, eh?”

“Fine,” Dís agreed. “Everything Bifur makes is fine, only I haven’t seen him - the beggar, Alric’s his name - I haven’t seen him since the first day we came.”

Bofur’s face fell slightly. “That’s a shame,” he said. “A real shame, but I s’pose it can’t be - hang on, d’you hear that?”

The bells again, soft, tinkling, but unmistakable amidst the snorting of horses and the creaking of the carts. With only a single, startled glance between themselves, Bofur and Dís ran toward the sound as fast as their legs could carry them. Alric heard them long before they approached and lifted his head, face slightly wary.

“Hallo, Alric!” Dís called, stopping short before she bowled him over. “You likely don’t remember me, I’m - ”

“Miss Dís, of course, the maiden with the unusual name,” Alric smiled at her. “And you’ve brought a companion, if I’m not mistaken.”

Bofur grinned hugely and bowed though the gesture was lost to Alric. 

“Bofur,” he said, ignoring the furrows in Alric’s brow when his voice came from somewhere rather lower than he’d been expecting. “Me friend here told me ‘bout your...situation, how you used to be a piper, but got no money for an instrument and we, ah...well, made you a little something. If you’ll take it.”

Awkwardly, Bofur held the thin pipe out until it bumped against Alric’s hand. His palm was cupped as if he expected a gift of a few pennies, but his fingers curled around the instrument automatically, his features registering shock and not a little happiness, but his mouth twisted down and he shook his head, trying to hand the pipe back to Bofur.

“I can’t,” he said, shaking his head. “No, no, you are overgenerous. I have no money, it would be - ”

“Don’t want no money, nor nothing for it,” Bofur said immediately, tucking his hands behind his back. “And it’s not me gift to take back, t’was made for you by me cousin, I’m just tasked to deliver it, s’all. Me cousin’s a carver, he were in a bad way when he come back from the wars, he wanted to give you something to…”

The downward turn of his lips gave Alric a doubtful appearance which deepened as Bofur trailed off, so Dís spoke up for both of them. “We’re...craftsfolk. Our people, if we don’t have summat to do with ourselves we run mad ere long.”

The doubt slid into confusion. “Your people?”

“Dwarves,” Bofur replied, ignoring the way Alric went slack-jawed in shock. “So rest assured you couldn’t have a better made pipe and that’s for certain! Go on, have a whistle. Plays a dream.”

Alric hesitated only slightly before he raised the flute to his lips. After a few minutes’ ungainly fumbling he played a simple tune, airy and sweet. Dís imagined it was something he learned when he was destined for the religious life. 

“There,” Bofur nodded, satisfied when he concluded. “Clear and pretty, to be sure.”

“You were quite correct,” Alric acknowledged with a smile and inclination of his head. “Plays a dream, I don’t...I don’t know how to thank you. This generosity, it...I could never have imagined such a thing.”

“It’s not generosity, not really, we’re not giving you more than you deserve, honest,” Dís insisted. A sharp whistle turned their attention back to the wagons. It was time to move on. “That’s us. We’ve got to be off. Goodbye. And good luck.”

“Wait, before you go,” Alric fumbled with the pipe, tucking it under the arm that held his walking stick. The bells jingled and swayed. “I’d have your hands.”

They each shook his hand warmly, but that was all they could do before another sharp whistle and a bellow for each of them called them away. As they mounted their ponies, Dís caught the sound of piping start up again, a marching song this time. She listened hard until their caravan rounded the top of the nearest hill and they were too far away to hear anything more from the town they left behind.


	7. Wrapping Paper (Vigg, Hervor, memories)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audience **Warning:** Nothing specific, just grief.
> 
> The songs Hervor sings are "The Lusty Young Smith" by Thomas D'Urfey and "Wild Mountain Thyme" by Francis McPeake. This little fic came out of nowhere, I read 'wrapping paper,' my brain went to 'butcher's paper,' and then said VIGG! I think I've hit a new level of fanfic-crazy when I write a fic from the POV of an OC's OC father entirely about other OC characters.

The swift hewing of bone and sinews with a cleaver was not quite the same as sending a spear through the chest of an orc, but there was a satisfaction in the butchering of dead meat nevertheless. It wasn’t what he’d been Made to do, but it put food on the table and there was precious little call for warriors in the Ered Luin. On the one hand, Vigg supposed he’d seen enough of slaughter to last him several lifetimes. On the other, he sometimes wished for a little excitement to break up the long cycles of the seasons.

On yet _another_ hand, he reflected as Hervor flew into the shop, late as usual, some days he thought he had about as much excitement as she could stand.

“Sorry, Da!” she apologized breathlessly before he had the chance to open his mouth and demand an explanation for her tardiness. “Dís called me over, wintertime, you know it’s slow at the forge, even _Thorin_ didn’t moan at us for wasting time so you know he was dead bored. Anyway, we got to talking and did you know that Mister Oin and Missus Irpa have an _understanding?_ Well, I don’t _know_ \- know, it hasn’t been told to either of us, not to our faces, but there’s been comings and goings and Nori told Dís and Dís told me, so I ran off to the counting-house to ask Glóin, but the clerks don’t have to be in until daybreak, so I had to _wait_ for Glóin, but he claimed to know nothing about it. I don’t doubt him either, he never notices anything he doesn’t want to see and his brother carrying on with Missus Irpa is _definitely_ something he wouldn’t - ”

“Take a breath,” Vigg instructed her. Hervor inhaled deeply, but before she let it out, he held up a hand and said, “Now get an apron on and get to work, there’s venison in the back wants gutting.”

“Aye, sir,” she replied, without a trace of guilt in her tone.

“And bind your hair back!” her father shouted after her as she disappeared behind the oilskin curtain the separated the front of their shop from the back. “The folk of this village expect their meat to come trussed up with twine, not your braids!”

“Aye, sir!” she called with an unmistakable laugh in her voice. Not half a moment later, she started whistling, then singing. The tune was cheerful, but the words so bawdy that Vigg stuck his head through the curtain a moment later to remind her that she was in a _shop_ not an _alehouse_ , so if she must sing, she ought to limit her repertoire to songs that did not give the word ‘hammer’ a double-meaning.

“Aye, sir,” she smiled at him so broadly and prettily that if Vigg wasn’t her father and did not know that look for the manipulative farce of daughterly obedience that it was, he might have been taken in. She did change the tune, something about gathering heather; it had been so long since Vigg last heard the song he almost didn’t recognize it.

_“Oh the summertime is coming_   
_And the trees are sweetly blooming_   
_And the wild mountain thyme_   
_Grows around the blooming heather._

_Will ye go, lassie, go?_   
_And we’ll all go together_   
_To pluck wild mountain thyme_   
_All around the blooming heather._   
_Will ye go, lassie, go?”_

Vigg almost barked at her again that the song was out of season for it was the dead of winter, hadn’t she noticed the ice on the steps and the snow on the ground? But she’d stopped singing of lusty smiths and he decided to count the change a victory, however small.

His next thought was to ask her how she remembered _that_ one, but he held his tongue. The last thing he needed at the moment was Hervor to tease him about his own poor work ethic, wasting time in conversation when he was meant to be filling orders.

It was only that he hadn’t heard the song in nearly half a century, not since the Mountain fell. A little ditty popular among courting couples, it was. Despite their race’s preference for gems and hardier substances as courting presents, it was the custom in springtime for couples to take in the outside air, wander the hills braid sprigs of heather into one another’s hair and beards. There was little courting when the mountain fell, little need to sing the old songs when new dirges seemed more suitable.

If he thought on it enough, it wasn’t hard to imagine where Hervor heard it. It was one of her mother’s favorite tunes, she hummed it to her enough as a baby that it was little wonder the song stuck, even if Hervor lost many things between the coming of the drake and their arrival in the Ered Luin. Heidrún sang to both of their children, all the time, to the point that Vigg was convinced they'd be humming before they were talking.

"If I don't have musical children," she informed him, with a wink, "I won't know what to do with them! Anyway, it's not as though I sing them bawds, eh? My little lad and lass will have _taste."_

Frigga liked the bawdy tunes and Heidrún's plans to raise children of taste were thoroughly routed by their aunt's influence. Frigga had never taken to courting herself, being too devoted to her craft and the Mountain Guard.

“No time!” she’d cry merrily, swinging Hervor or Heidrek or Thorin or Frerin or any one of the little dwarflings who called her ‘Auntie’ whether or not she was their aunt in fact. She was so fond of children, Freya asked her more than once why she never had any of her own, even if she did not want to wed. “Your lot keep me plenty entertained, no need to worry on my account.”

His younger sister was not yet middle-aged when the Mountain fell. There was time for her to change her mind, if her mind was one to be changed. She loved children so much; Vigg thought she would have made a fine mother. An indulgent mother, perhaps, but a fine one.

The cleaver felt onto the cutting board with a thump. Vigg consciously kept his hand away from his face and instead wiped his watering eyes on a clean patch of his sleeve.

_”If my true love she were gone_   
_I would surely find another_   
_To pluck wild mountain thyme_   
_All around the blooming heather.”_

Too late now to ask Hervor to sing another ditty; she’d hear the catch in his voice and that would set her worrying. For no reason for his grief wasn’t anything she could ease through word or deed. It sneaked up on him unexpectedly at strange moments. Sometimes he would hear a laugh that reminded him of his sister or he’d see a form in the marketplace and be _so sure_ it was his son; many a night he still woke in darkness, reaching for a body beside him that was not there. Or, as it turned out, his daughter would sing a song from long ago and sing it so heartily and so well that the decades would melt away and he’d miss all of them at once.

Rolling his eyes up, he stared at the ceiling and picked up his cleaver. When the music died away, Vigg wrapped the order up in thick brown paper. By then his voice was steady enough to call Hervor back in, only to order her to go out again.

With a smile and another cheery, “Aye, sir!” she gathered up the parcels and hurried out the door.

“Don’t you dare laze half the day away gossiping at the forge!” he called after her. “You hear me, lass?”

But Hervor was already out the door and left Vigg alone in the silence.


	8. Crackers (Thorin/Bilbo, Modern!AU)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** PG-13 **Warnings:** M/M, swearing, general irreverence. Also un-Britpicked.
> 
> This story takes place in my _The Trouble with Chocolate Kisses_ modern!biker!AU wherein Thorn is a mechanic who gets involved with his nephews' primary school teacher and his entire extended family decides to stick their noses in his relationship. We've seen them at a pub, I think it's time to see them at Christmas.

When he asked Thorn if he ought to wear anything special for attending Christmas dinner at his Aunt Dora’s house, he hadn’t taken him seriously when his boyfriend replied, “Pajamas.”

Bill honestly thought it was a euphemism. A joke - Thorn did make jokes sometimes. Or a coded message: Don’t dress up. No tie, but a button-down wouldn’t go amiss. Good jeans in a dark wash. A cardigan instead of a blazer. That sort of thing.

So when Dis and Thorn turned up in front of his flat wearing matching red plaid pajama bottoms and _slippers_ under their heavy coats, he was more than a little taken aback.

So was Dis. “You didn’t tell him!” she exclaimed, smacking Thorn on the arm.

“I did!” her brother replied, but hesitated before he hit her back. His thick eyebrows drew together in a little ‘v’ over his nose; it was an expression that Bill once thought signified anger, but he realised eventually that it meant Thorn was befuddled. Now he found it adorable. “Didn’t I?”

“You did,” Bill nodded and Thorn then felt free to punch his sister. Decided that adding, _Only I didn’t take you seriously,_ was probably a bad move, he waffled a bit before explaining his fully-dressed appearance by stammering, “Only. Er. I forgot!”

The car’s horn beeped obnoxiously behind them; Phil had unbuckled himself and was leaning over the driver’s seat, pushing on the horn with both hand whilst Killi banged on the windows impatiently.

“Oi! Knock it off, you two!” Dis shouted, brandishing the keys threateningly, Bill’s inappropriate attire forgotten. Phil scurried back into his seat and frantically attempted to fasten his safety belt before his mother reached him.

Bill closed the door behind him even as Thorn insisted, “No, no, don’t mind them, change if you want. Supper’s not for a few hours anyway, we’re early, they’re just being brats.”

“It’s alright,” Bill waved his hand nonchalantly. “Er. Just so long as I won’t be made to wait in the car because I’m overdressed.”

Thorn smiled warmly and shook his head, “Nah, won’t happen - if it did, I’d be sure to bring you out a plate.”

“Such a gentleman,” Bill grinned, punching Thorn lightly on the arm. It was a gesture of affection among his boyfriend’s friends and family, one that Bill adopted after many months of suffering well-meaning blows without giving any back. Rob was the one who told him he ought to give as good as he got, otherwise he figured it was abuse on their parts and wasn’t _that_ awkward?

Bill squeezed in the back of the car with Phil and Killi who apologized immediate for being, “A nuisance and disturbing the peace.”

“That’s alright,” he smiled at them and the boys swapped identical grins. They were really quite cute kids, if one ignored the fact that they were too hyper by half, only bound to become moreso when they were stuffed to the gills with chocolates, which they would inevitably be by the end of the night. Ah well, Killi’d moved ahead a year in school and Bill was no longer required to play any role in their lives other than that of indulgent-boyfriend-of-their-uncle-who-possibly-had-a-few-chocolates-stowed-on-his-person-to-make-them-mind.

“We’re forgiven?” Phil asked excitedly.

“Yep, water under the bridge,” Bill nodded and Killi hooted for joy.

“That means we’ll still get presents, Mum?” he asked Dis. “Santa won’t skip us ‘cos we were naughty?”

Dis shrugged. “Dunno, love, I haven’t seen his list. Could be you’ll wake up to lumps of coal, you won’t know ‘til tomorrow morning. Best keep up the good behaviour, just in case.”

The two of them actually folded their hands in their laps and sat, stiff-backed in their seats...for about twelve seconds. Then the chorus of, “I’m hungry,” and “I need to use the loo,” and “Are we _there_ yet?” started up and did not cease until Dis popped _The Nightmare Before Christmas_ into the CD player to drown them out.

Bill had been to Dora and Frank’s house a few times in the past year or so, mercifully there wasn’t that stomach-churning ‘meeting the in-laws’ dread that accompanied first time visits, he’d met just about all of Thorn’s extended family - well, all but one.

Thorn’s grandfather, Thornton Durin the...Third? Second? Fifth? It was an _old_ family name, he’d been told, but neither Thorn nor his grandad were very fond of it. For as long as any of them could remember, Thornton Durin the Elder simply went by ‘Tom.’ Whatever he was called, Bill hadn’t laid eyes on him before, though he had been reassured that it wasn’t an intentional slight. Those days he dropped by Thorn’s family shop after work, Tom had either just left or hadn’t arrived, the derby bouts he managed to attend Tom had to skip and although Tom _had_ been in attendance at the school’s Nativity play, Bill was getting over a dreadful cold and hadn’t gone for fear of infecting his colleagues before the holiday.

Still, one out of...thirty wasn’t that bad. He wasn’t sure he could take the pressure of meeting the whole Durin family at once coupled with the sinking feeling he was already suffering from, of being an intruder on a family holiday.

Not that he _was_ intruding. Dora was the one who insisted he come when she found out that he didn’t have anyone to spend Christmas with. He knew he was welcome, had been reminded several times since the invitation was issued and accepted that he was welcome, but there were going to be a _lot_ of people in attendance and a three bedroom semi wasn’t all that big when you got right down to it.

Sometimes, he reflected as they exited the car and made their way to the front door of the cozy house, he thought the Durin clan would be better off in a mead hall.

Thorn had a key, but just as soon as he slipped it into the lock, the door swung open and he was gathered into a firm hug as a deep, gruff voice wished him a happy Christmas.

Every time Bill saw Thorn’s Uncle Frank he was always taken aback. The man was absolutely massive in height and build and Bill was forever forgetting just how _tall_ he was. He probably looked like a right idiot, he felt his eyes widen and took a half-step back without fail, but mercifully Thorn’s family had the kindness not to laugh openly at him. for the man seemed even larger than he was the last time he’d laid eyes on him. He really needed to get over it, after all, Frank’s size went a long way toward explaining where Dwain came from. The first time Bill saw mother and son standing side by side, he was sure Dwain must have been adopted.

Dis was about six foot even in stocking feet, but she threw herself at her uncle and he lifted her clean off the ground with very little touble. Two flashes of movement and scarves bustled past Bill and once Dis was set back down, Phil and Killi were both swept up into their great-uncle’s embrace and given a kiss each.

“You lot been good?” he asked, looking them over critically. “You don’t want Father Christmas forgetting where we live, do you?”

“We’ve been good,” Killi reassured him. “Haven’t we, Mum?”

“Goodish,” Dis nodded, squeezing past her uncle to go inside. Bill followed after her and smiled at Frank; since his arms were full, it looked like Bill wasn’t going to be getting a hug and his ribs were very grateful.

“Glad you could make it, Merry Christmas,” he said, smirking. “Thorn not tell you about the holiday uniform?”

“He forgot.” Thorn sounded rather miffed by the insinuation that he would have forgotten to let Bill in on something as important as the Christmas Eve Pajama Party. “I did tell him.”

“Sure you did,” Frank winked at Bill and Bill grinned back at him. This was one perk of being around Thorn’s older relatives; his very stoic, rather serious-minded boyfriend had a hard time maintaining his gruff Northern charm around his aunts and uncles. Occasionally the best he managed was the long-suffering petulance of twelve-year-old. As Frank stepped backward to let Bill pass into the house an indignant little yelp sounded from behind him.

“Careful!” Dora piped up, side-stepping around her husband. Her arms were free and she did give Bill a hug, but hers weren’t quite as reminiscent of being squeezed flat by a vice as her husband’s. “Merry Christmas, dear. Thorn, there’s a goose in my oven.”

“Oh,” Thorn replied as he bent down to give his aunt a hug and a kiss. “Erm. Did it just wander in to warm up a bit?”

“Nope, your Irish friends brought it,” she clarified, gesturing toward the kitchen with the air of someone who had surrendered control of their home without being quite sure how that happened. “Apparently they thought they were going to the Cratchit house.”

“I told him no!” Rob’s voice sounded from the direction of the sitting room. “I said - didn’t I say, Lee? - I said, ‘Let’s not do a goose, you’re not Charles Dickens,’ but he wouldn’t be swayed!’

“Do I like goose?” Phil asked Frank, cocking his head to one side curiously and sniffing the air like a dog, trying to work out if he’d smelled the particular smells wafting over from the kitchen before.

“We’ll find out later,” Frank shrugged. “If you like it, I’ll give you mine.”

“We’ve also got two turkeys so don’t go complaining about the supper now,” Brian said, sliding out of the kitchen on a pair of...yes, those were zombie heads that appeared to be devouring his legs. He too was clad in pajamas and a faded band t-shirt, but he topped his ensemble off with a threadbare sweatshirt and an apron that was decorated with a picture of an actor Bill vaguely remembered from a recent Bond film. Danish, was he? And evidently a chef?

The oddest thing about Brian’s outfit by far was the little hair net that he had looped around his ears, covering his chin - but then Bill realised it would effectively keep his beard out of the food and recognized the thoughtfulness of it.

“Tell them where one of the turkeys is,” Dora urged him, tucking a lock of violently blue hair behind one of her rather elaborately pierced ears. Unless Bill was very much mistaken the ring that usually decorated her nose had been replaced by a tiny snowman. “Geese are traditional, granted, but tell them where you’re putting the second turkey.”

“In the oven,” he replied innocently and earned an affectionate smack on the arm.

“Alright, where’s the _first_ turkey, then?”

“In the garden,” Brian admitted, running a hand through his hair distractedly.

Thorn stared at him, mouth slack. “What?”

“I hate to be the one to tell you,” Dis patted Brian consolingly on the shoulder, “but it’s recommended that you kill the turkey _before_ dinner.”

“Uncle Brian has to kill a turkey?” Killi squeaked, alarmed by the notion. “Can’t we just keep it for a pet?”

“It’s already dead, kiddo,” Brian assured him. “Very dead. _Extremely_ dead. The turkey has ceased to be, it’s ready for the fryer. I figured I’d go traditional on two birds and do a little something different with the third.”

“And _I_ said just because you see something on Masterchef doesn’t mean you need to try it out in other people’s kitchens.” Brian’s very pregnant wife Tara joined them half a moment later, a whisk in one hand and a carton of cream in the other. Her hair was short, spiky and blonde. When Bill first made her acquaintance several months prior, it had been purple, but she cut it once her roots started growing out, citing hair dye as bad for foetuses.

“Happy holidays and all that,” she said briskly, turning back to the kitchen. “I’ve got to go, I’m battling some very uncooperative egg whites in another room - for the record, Martha Stewart’s a lying C U Next Tuesday and can kiss my bottom.”

“Don’t go blaming Brian for the turkey!” Dis called after Tara. “It’s not his fault, realy. You get in a house with enough Scotspeople and it’s only a matter of time before _something_ winds up in the fryer. Let’s just be grateful it wasn’t one of the kids.”

Everyone had a good laugh at that. Everyone except Thorn.

“Hang on,” he said slowly, a look of dawning horror stealing over his face. “Does this mean there’s no ham?”

“Five quid,” Frank said to his wife, who sighed and nodded as she puttered off to find her purse.

“Five quid for what?” Phil asked curiously.

“I bet your auntie that Thorn’d ask about ham less than five minutes after he got here,” he informed the child who nodded knowingly. “She figured he’d at least get his coat off before he said anything.”

“It’s not Christmas without a ham,” Thorn complained, peeling his coat off and tossing it over the bannister.

Frank gave him a sharp look, “Hey now, mind your manners. Pick it up and put it in the bedroom. Just throw it over your cousin if she’s still in bed, might wake her up and get her out talking to people.”

“If you want a ham, you’re welcome to run out and buy me another oven,” Dora informed him, returning with her husband’s winnings. “As it is, we’re out of room. I’ll do a ham for New Year’s, how’s that?”

Bill was quite sure he’d never seen Thorn look more distressed. “Is there bacon, at least? In something? There’s got to be bacon in something.”

Dora put her hands up innocently and shook her head, “Go ask Gordon Ramsay in there about the menu, I haven’t the foggiest. I’ve given up the kitchen for the day, all I’ve got to do is run the dishwasher a few times and provide bedding.”

Thorn disappeared into the kitchen, coat in hand, to do just that. Though the importance of ham as both a comfort and sign of stability in Thorin’s life could not be overemphasized, abandoning Bill in the foyer with his relations while he ran off in pursuit of pork products was a little much.

“Let’s see where everyone else is at,” Dis said, grabbing Bill’s elbow and leading him into the sitting room.

“Parked in front of the television when last I saw them,” Frank said, following the two of them into a scene of utter chaos.

An old horror movie was playing on the television - something to do with Frankenstein, if Bill wasn’t mistaken, but Rob was the only one watching it. He was sitting on the back of the sofa with his feet on the - no, they weren’t on the cushions, there were no cushions, the cushions were on the floor, serving as makeshift wrestling mats. Brian and Tara’s twins, Billy and Kitty, were taking on Dwain and his elder brother Blaise; Bill couldn’t help feel the match-up was a bit uneven.

The only one who was parked was Rob and Brian’s cousin Liam, whose wheelchair was situated in such a way as to give him a good view of the telly and keep him well out of the fray of shrieking children. He gave them all a wave when they came in and joked, “I would get up, but…”

“And I’d laugh if I hadn’t heard that joke a thousand times,” Dis crawled over Dwain, kissing Kitty as she passed and made her way over the arm of the sofa, negotiating a walk around Rob’s knees, to give Liam a hug. “Keeping an eye on things?”

“Yep,” he nodded. “Ought to have brought my crutches, could’ve given ‘em a jab when they got too rowdy.”

“Haven’t even broken a sweat,” Dwain rolled his eyes, pinning Billy down with one hand. “These two are getting soft in their old age.”

“We’re not _old_ ,” Kitty countered. Sauntering right up to Dwain, she jabbed him in the nose with one little finger. _“You’re_ old. You haven’t got any hair.”

Blaise laughed his arse off. “She’s got you there,” he grinned.

When Bill first met him, he was struck by how unlike the rest of his family Blaise seemed, at first and didn’t quite know what to make of him. He was an art history professor at a university a few miles away and did some kind of outreach program with wayward kids, his work attire consisted largely of things that Bill himself would have considered the height of fashion: pressed trousers, courderoy blazers, that sort of thing. There was nothing unusual about him, save for the small ponytail that was always neatly contained by an elastic at the nape of his neck and though he too sported a beard, it was very well-kempt.

Then over the summer, when Bill got roped into going on an outing to the beach with Thorn, Dwain, Rob, Dis and the kids, Blaise decided to join them. And the second he exchanged his button-down shirt for a pair of swimming trunks, Bill saw that he wasn’t quite as conventional as he believed. From his collar to his wrists - exactly the places covered by a nice conservative button-down - he was absolutely covered in colorful tattoos. Bill had no eye for that sort of thing, but even he could see they were quite stunning.

“Who do you think is older?” Blaise prompted Kitty, poking her in the tummy and prompting a fit of giggles. “Me or him?”

“Him,” she replied immediately, giving Blaise a jab in his own midsection in retaliation. “You’ve got all your hair.”

“Right, that’s it,” Dwain huffed. He got up off the floor tucking Kitty under one arm. The little girl hug upside down, her pigtails trailing toward the floor as she shrieked with laughter. “Into the fryer with you - you’re about as big as the turkey, I think. Anyone fancy some roast Kitty-Cat for dinner? TARA! YOU’RE NOT ATTACHED TO THE GIRL CHILD AT ALL, ARE YOU?”

Bill _barely_ managed to keep his hands from reflexively putting his hands over his ears. Years of spending nine hours a day with a classroom full of often screaming five and six-year-olds made him immune to most sudden loud noises, but Dwain had a mighty bellow.

So did Tara, as it turned out. “DO WHAT YOU WILL!” she shouted from the kitchen. “WE’RE MAKING ANOTHER ONE, YOU CAN CHUCK THAT ONE, IF YOU WANT. I THINK SHE’D BE LOVELY WITH SOME ROAST CARROTS!”

Liam snorted and shook his head, “Use your heads, both of you. There’s not enough to go around - look at the state of her, hardly a scrap of meat on those bones. I’ll take a turkey any day.”

“Let me take your coat,” Frank offered to Bill, depositing Phil and Killi on the floor to join the mayhem. “And you two, put the cushions back on the sofa, people want to sit.”

“Yeah, Dad,” they chorused together and proceeded to do nothing of the sort as Killi jumped off the arm on the couch to land on Dwain’s back. Feeling a little at loose ends and rather wanting to find Thorn, at least to provide comfort if his quest for bacon proved unsuccessful, Bill followed Frank back out into the foyer just as someone aggressively banged on the front door.

“That’d be Harry, I don’t think you’ve met him yet Bill,” Dora jogged in from the kitchen and hurried to open the door, presumably so it didn’t splinter.

Bill shook his head in the negative, but didn’t get the chance to reply as the door opened and a balled fist made its way into the house, stopping just short of Dora’s nose.

“Hi!” she cried cheerily. “Merry - what is that?”

The scruffy looking sixtyish man with Elvis Costello glasses, dressed in sweats and some kind of enormous plaid hunting hat, thrust a square of newsprint forcefully Dora’s face. She took the paper and pushed her glasses up her nose, commenting, “Oh, the Daily Mail, how charming. Is this my Christmas present? You would’ve done better to bring coal, it burns longer - ‘Fifty Shades of Grey library book tests positive for herpes and cocaine...’ _really?”_

Frank, who happened to be standing right behind her and read aloud with a furrowed brow, “Research was carried out by toxicolo - fuck me, _toxicologist_ professor...yeah, not going to try and pronounce his name...the level of cocaine found wasn’t enough to get readers high...hang on, this happened in Belgium, why do you care?”

 _“Herpes,”_ the vagabond hissed, breath misting on the air. “The book was covered in _herpes.”_

“Yeah, Harry, I think we’ve got the gist,” Frank interrupted him, handing the newsclipping back. “Come in, you’re letting the hot air out.”

Dora tried to approach him for a hug, but Harry warded her off with the newspaper clipping.

“Don’t kiss me,” he said sourly. “I probably have herpes. Do you know how many times I’ve handled that fucking book? There were over one thousand holds for _three solid months._ And I don’t care if this happened in fucking Belgium, they’ve not got a monopoly on STIs, with my luck, I’ve got a herpes copy and not a coke copy sitting on a shelf right now, but I’m not supposed to go on and _check_ because of the fucking baby Jesus shutting my library down - ”

“Let’s settle for a careful hug then,” Dora said, wrapping her arms around her brother. “Anyway, I think the article said it was only cold sore herpes, not _herpes_ -herpes, I’m sure you’ll be fine...”

Frank, adding Harry’s coat to the collection he was taking, bent as he passed Bill and assured him, “That one’s just an in-law.”

“This is just what we need!” Harry moaned, arms flailing as soon as Dora released him from the hug. “Budgets getting cut everywhere, people buying e-readers and _now_ it comes out that all our books are going to give you genital warts and get your kids high!”

“It did specifically say the book _wasn’t_ going to get anyone high,” Dora replied evenly, shooting Bill an apologetic smile. “Anyway, put on your company manners. Harry this is Bill, Thorn’s boyfriend, Bill this is my brother Harry.”

“Nice to meet you,” Bill stuck his hand out awkwardly, but Harry shook his head.

“Better not risk it,” he sighed and rounded on his sister. “Do you have anti-bacterial soap? Or _bleach?”_

“I don’t know, I’ll check - bearing in mind that herpes is caused by a virus, so anti-bacterial soup won’t do much good,” Dora said, plucking her brother’s hat off his head. He was mostly bald with a ring of dark grey hair that stuck straight up when his hat was removed. “Drink, Bill? While I’m on my way past the kitchen? We’ve got beer, scotch, vodka, more beer...whiskey, I think. And water, of course.”

“Erm, water’s fine, actually,” he said, eyeing harry a little apprehensively. The man was unrolling the sleeves of his flannel shirt down over his hands and still looked slightly less than sane, even with his outer layers gone. “I’ll get it myself, I don’t want to be a bother - ”

“Oh, no bother! Anyway, I’d say stay out of the kitchen, Brian’s rather taken over, he was just about to shoo Thorn out - ”

“There’s no bacon,” Thorn announced as he entered the corridor. “Not one slice in this house, how do you _live_ like this?”

“Go to the market and get some,” Frank suggested. He lost the coats, but gained a teenage girl, who he marched into the already overfull foyer by the back of the neck. “Rosie, say hello to everyone.”

“Hi, everyone,” she waved a little sheepishly. Frank and Dora referred to Rosemary lovingly as their surprise baby, (as opposed to Blaise who was referred to just as lovingly as their ‘whoops’ baby), she was fourteen, tall, stocky and all Bill really knew about her was that she went by ‘Roz’ around her friends, played girls’ rugby and spent an awful lot of time on the internet. “Sorry I went missing.”

“Where were you?” her mother asked, cocking her head up at her. “You said you had to check your email and you’d be right out, that was over an hour ago.”

“Tumblr,” Roz shrugged a little vaguely. “Is everybody here?”

Dora shook her head, darting back toward the kitchen when she heard something clatter and fall, followed by some very colourful cursing. “No, not your aunt and uncle and cousin, or your grandparents - go set the table, could you? Thanks, sweetie.”

Bill took the opportunity to slide a little closer to Thorn, who patted his arm absently with his left hand and flipped his mobile phone open with his right. “Hang on, I’m going to make a quick call - Gran, have you left yet?”

In another feat of technical incompetence Thorn, ringing up his grandmother on speed dial, also managed to put her on speaker at the same time. “Yeah,” a husky woman’s voice sounded tinny coming from the cheap mobile. “We’re pulling up now.”

“Have you got out of the car?” Thorn asked, wiping off off the window and peering out to the street outside.

“Yep.”

“How far out of the car?”

A sturdy index finger poked Thorin forcefully in the back of the head. “I’m right behind you,” his grandmother deadpanned.

“Oh,” he said. He didn’t even try to mask his disappointment, being the oversized, excessively hairy twelve-year-old that Bill spied earlier. “Hi.”

“Hi yourself, ingrate,” she replied, pulling him in for a hug. Thorn couldn’t have resisted if he tried. It was easy to see why everyone in that family was so damned tall - Bill never asked, but he assumed that Margaret (she said he could call her Mags, everyone did, but he never managed to remember) - the woman had to be in her seventies, but she was nearly eye-level with Thorn.

Still, Bill had met Margaret before, he was _expecting_ Margaret. What he was not expecting was for Father Christmas himself to follow behind her, wiping his boots off on the carpet and shaking frozen rain out of his snowy white beard.

Because it _was_ Father Christmas. Coca Cola itself could not have dreamed of a more perfect imagine of the spirit of the season than the one which boomed out, “Happy Christmas!” in a deep, cheerful voice that got everyone in the house shouting the season’s greetings back and flooding the foyer for a hug.

Clement Moore must have had this very image in his mind when he wrote his famous poem. The man’s cheeks were ruddy, his heavy coat unbuttoned to reveal a red t-shirt pulled down over a pot belly and his eyes actually _twinkled._

It was all Bill could do to keep from running to the window to check and see that an enormous sleigh wasn’t parked on the sidewalk with nine reindeer harnessed in the front.

He did grabbed Thorn once the man was released from his grandfather’s embrace so that he could hiss in his ear, “You know, you might’ve told me that you’re a direct descendant of _Santa Claus.”_

To his simultaneous amusement and consternation, Thorn laughed and scrubbed a hand over his hair, “Sorry, I’m used to him, you forget - want to make a Tesco’s run?”

“Er, okay, sure,” Bill nodded, still side-eyeing Father Christmas as they tried to make their way out the door unobtrusively.

Naturally, they were spotted. If he could see children when they were sleeping and awake with such attention that the had better make a point to be good (for goodness’s sake), it was little wonder he could spot two grown men trying to squeeze out a normal sized door in broad daylight.

“One minute!” Father Christmas shouted and Bill stopped because he might be thirty-one, but he certainly didn’t want coal in his stocking. “Bill, isn’t it? Come here, come here, I’ve heard so much about you, don’t tell me you’re leaving?”

“Just going to the shop,” Thorn replied. “Since Gran won’t do it for me, we’ll be back in a minute - ”

“At least let me say hello,” Father Christmas interrupted, extending his hand for Bill to shake. His smile was broad and welcoming and Bill smiled right back. “Hello!”

“Hi!” Bill squeaked, once again seven years old, trying to get all his Christmas list out in one breath before the photographer snapped the picture. “It’s, er, really, really nice to meet you. Sir.”

Father Christmas laughed. It broke the spell a bit when he didn’t actually go, ‘Ho, ho, ho.’ “Call me Tom, everyone does! Are the shops open today?”

“I’ll find out,” Thorn said determinedly, grabbing Bill’s arm and hauling him out of the house.

“Nice meeting you!” Father - alright, alright, _Tom_ waved at them as they made a beeline for Dis’s car.

“Thorn always goes a bit weird when he gets himself a fellow,” Bill heard Mags say as she shut the door behind them.

Bill took a deep breath in when he got into the car, held it, and exhaled just as Thorn sat next to him in the driver’s seat. He made no move to start the engine or actually go anywhere, he just sat still, staring into space for a minute.

“Er,” Bill began uncertainly. “Is the bacon really that important?”

“No,” Thorn shook his head and gave Bill a little half-smile. “I just thought you might want to get out of the house for a bit.”

“Hang on…” Understanding dawned slowly and when it did, he felt his heart melt a little, despite the cold air in the car. Thorn was really, at the end of the day, one of the _sweetest_ blokes Bill had ever met. And how could he not be, coming from such a family as that. “The ham thing was a ruse? To give us a breather?”

“Well, I’d rather we had a ham than a fucking goose,” Thorn admitted, shrugging. “But yeah, I just wanted an out in case you needed a second to...I dunno, get out of there. You had a bit of a deer-in-headlights look about you and I know you’re too damned polite to tell my family to fuck off.”

“Well, yeah,” Bill nodded. “But mostly I was shocked to discover that you happen to be related to a supernatural being and I’ve known you almost a year. I’d have thought it’d come up before now. ‘By the way, that grandad I keep talking about? Lives at the North Pole, it’s why you’ve never met.’”

Thorn threw back his head and laughed. Bill would have crawled over and kissed him had he not been 100% certain that the entire family was gathered round the windows with their noses pressed against the glass watching them. He wasn’t an exhibitionist.

“He’s jolly, I s’pose,” Thorn agreed. “I am sorry about the clothes thing, I forgot to tell you, didn’t I? It’s no big deal, really, just how we do it round here. Auntie Dora reckons everyone’s got fussy in-laws to dress up for on the day, she wants her dinners to be as low-key as possible.”

“You told me,” Bill reassured him, patting Thorn’s leg. “I just didn’t...I thought you weren’t being serious. When I was a kid and we went to my grandparents’ house, I had to wear a tie.”

“Urgh, that sounds painful,” Thorn groaned, pawing at his neck as though loosening the offending article of clothing. All his fingers found was the neck of his t-shirt, but even the thought of putting on an actual tie made him feel claustrophobic.

“Well, it was a clip-on, my grandfather always complained it wasn’t straight, but every time he tried to fix it, it just came off,” Bill smiled at the memory. “He did teach me how to tie a real bow-tie, which has come in handy maybe four times in my life, but I was grateful. They were nice people, just a little stuffy - that’s my dad’s side of the family. Mum’s was a lot more...well. Like yours.”

Bill didn’t crawl onto Thorn’s lap, but he did lean over and bump shoulders with him. “You don’t need to...I don’t know, save me from them. I _like_ your family, the whole merry lot. I’ve got aunts and uncles of my own, a whole gaggle of cousins, but time goes on, people move away. Have children, lose touch. No one’s fault, really, I could pick up a phone and call them just as easily as they could me. The fact that you all see each other so much, you’re so close...it’s nice.”

Thorn bumped his shoulder into Bill’s, then put one of his rough hands against his leg and gave it a squeeze, “Nice, eh? That’s not the first thing most people say when they see us coming down the road.”

“Then they’re not as lucky as I am to know you all,” Bill said simply. “I’m just...very happy you found me. All of you.”

This was threatening to become A Moment. Thorn didn’t really do Moments, so he let his hand slide off Bill’s thigh and cocked an eyebrow at him. “So what I’m getting from this,” he said with half-hearted consternation. “Is that you basically used me to get to know my family.”

Bill punched him hard on the shoulder. “You twat!” he declared. “Anymore of that and you won’t get your present.”

“Oh! Hang on,” Thorin reached into the pocket of his pajamas just as Bill was pulling something out of the front pocket of his cardigan. “It’s not much - ”

“If you’re giving me mine, I’ll get you yours, I wasn’t sure - ”

“Wasn’t sure what to get you,” they both said simultaneously. In their hands were matching, unwrapped £50 Amazon gift cards.

It was Bill who broke the silence. “You realise this is probably the most romantic thing that will ever happen to me,” he said calmly, looking into Thorn’s wide blue eyes. “You _do_ realise that, right?”

In that instant, Thorn decided to give in to the dual spirits of compatibility and holiday miracles to have A Moment. He leaned over and, in a very cold car, on a very quiet street, with most of his extended family and friends watching from the windows, leaned over and gave his boyfriend a very fine kiss.

When they came back up for air, Thorn was frowning. “Is this the card you bought for me or the one I bought for you?” he asked.

Bill threw his hands up and laughed, “Haven’t a clue! Come on, unless you’re actually planning on starting the car, let’s go back in, I’m freezing.”

“Can’t have that,” Thorn replied, putting an arm around Bill and leading him back inside the house, warm and cozy with the smell of roasting fowl.

Gav and Harry (who was dubbed ‘Cool!Harry’ the second she walked through the door to avoid any confusion with Dora’s brother, who was dubbed, ‘Grumpy!Harry’ since calling him ‘Herpes!Harry’ was inappropriate around the children) turned up with Gimli just in time to watch Brian drop the first turkey into a pot of hot oil, setting fire to absolutely nothing at all to everyone’s simultaneous relief and disappointment Frank’s brother George came with his wife Maeve and Gavin’s elder brother Owen, the OB-GYN who reassured Tara that consuming the wine in the gravy wouldn’t cause her foetus to be born without arms.

The dining room was so stifling hot with everyone crammed around a table that was at least five seats too small to accommodate them, even _with_ the smallest children on laps, that Tom elected to open a window, letting in a welcome blast of frigid air. No one suggested spreading out, some eating in front of the television, some in the kitchen, not even when the sound of eight different conversations being carried on at once meant no one could actually keep track of what everyone was saying.

The chaos, two different forks jabbing the same cut of meat, the constant shouts of, “WHAT?” and “PASS THE - fuck it, I’ll get it,” and “SHUT UP I CAN’T HEAR MYSELF THINK!” were as much a part of the festive air as the red and green fairy lights, the paper crowns and the goose which Frank declared was a new tradition after he took one bite and declared the bird “fan-bloody-tastic.” He was more than happy to take Phil’s portion off his plate in exchange for some roast potatoes.

Dessert was only slightly less squashed, helpings of cakes and tarts were removed from the kitchen and taken into the sitting room where every flat surface was used as a chair. Whilst Roz and Dora set the table, Dis and Rob set up air mattresses and sleeping bags for those who would be staying the night and they now covered the floor. The horror movies were done away with, until midnight, they were treated to another family tradition - every film of _A Christmas Carol_ that Frank and Dora owned, beginning with the George C. Scott version.

“The best version,” Dora announced as she popped the tape in.

“Wrong!” Frank shouted from the armchair he had to physically wrestle George out of in order to claim it for his own. “Alastair Sim, hands down.”

“You’re both wrong,” Tom shook his head and rolled his eyes. He managed to get a seat on the sofa, but Phil and Killi each claimed a portion of his lap to sit in, balancing their slices of cake precariously on their laps. “My favourite’s the one with Kermit the Frog, it’s the best.”

No one could disagree with that opinion and soon the only sounds that filled the little house were those of people chewing and George C. Scott shouting.

By the film’s end, Kitty and Billy were on the verge of falling asleep, so Brian, Tara and Liam decided it would be a good time to make their leave, as Tara needed to Skype her mother in Ireland before it got too late.

Rob planned on staying the night, but he needed to take Liam back to their flat first. It was getting late and Bill had made no plans to spend Christmas morning with the Durins, so he too rose from his place on the sofa beside Thorn (and under Killi) to fetch his coat.

“No need to get up,” Rob told Thorn. “I can give Bill a ride back to his place, can’t I? ‘Less you’ve got a Christmas surprise you were planning on showing off in the car, but I _think_ that’s a hazard - ”

Thorn lobbed the remote control at his head with surprising accuracy and force.

“I don’t mind,” Bill told Thorn as Rob rubbed his forehead and claimed that he’d been blinded. “Stay, they’re already leaving, there’s no sense in both of you leaving and coming back.”

Thorn looked doubtful, but the thought of putting his coat and hat back on and venturing into the cold did not look all that appealing next to staying in a nice warm house with desserts two rooms over. “If you’re sure - ” he began, but Roz interrupted him.

“You ought to get Bill’s coat with him,” she suggested to Thorin. “They were all laid on my bed.”

“Her room’s upstairs on the - ” Thorn began, but his young cousin pinched his leg from her place on the floor.

 _“Show_ him,” she insisted and the way she was waggling her eyebrows made it clear that her suggestion was really a _suggestion._ And a trick. The second Thorn got up from the sofa to escort Bill to her room, Roz jumped up and took his place, squashing in next to her grandfather and curling up with her head on his shoulder.

Thorn trudged up the stairs, Bill following along after him with a smile on his face. “Your family couldn’t be more supportive,” he offered brightly. “That’s nice, isn’t it?”

“More nosy, you mean,” Thorn rolled his eyes and stepped into Roz’s room, dark, but he could make out the shapes of the coats on the bed and he found Bill’s quickly enough. Rather than handing it over, when Bill made to take it, Thorin pulled him closer, lowering his head for a quick kiss. “Thanks for putting up with them.”

Bill’s bright smile became luminous. “It’s really all fine,” he reassured Thorn, patting the other man’s arm. “I _like_ them, and I love you so even if I didn’t - ”

The words stopped and Bill made a sort of humming sound in the back of his throat, as though he’d just done something surprising. Thorn stood stock still waiting for...well, what he didn’t know. Takesies-backsies, maybe? A blush, a stammer? Once when Thorn was small he tripped up and called a primary school teacher ‘Mum,’ maybe the mention of the l-word was like that, a fluke brought on by too much...eggnog.

Rather than turning red and blaming the eggnog, Bill squared his shoulders and continued, “And I love you, so even if I wasn’t keen on them - which I _am_ \- you’re worth any bother, nosiness or shouting. Now, go on. Say it back before I feel like I’ve made a fool of myself.”

The smile on Thorn’s face wasn’t so much a smile as it was a lopsided grin, a better fit for a puppy than a full grown man.

“I love you too,” he said, gruffly, but then Thorn was gruff, wasn’t he? At least, he was supposed to be, the sort who rode his bike recklessly and got into pub brawls, not the sort who made romantic Christmas Eve declarations while standing amidst a tangle of fairy lights in the room of a teenaged girl.

Sometimes, having a house full of blood!family and adopted-friends!family could come in handy. Especially when well-timed interruptions saved Thorn from the heart-pounding, face-reddening indignity of Talking About His Feelings. Bill was his boyfriend, after all, not his therapist.

“Ready to go, Bill?” Rob shouted up the stairs. “Or are you staying?”

“You can stay,” Thorn said, realizing uncomfortably that he still hadn’t let go of Bill’s coat. “If you want.”

Bill leaned up to kiss him one last time and declined. “I really do adore your family,” he reassured Thorn for about the thousandth time. “But I’d rather not sleep on the floor, if it’s all the same to you.”

Being that Thorin’s back was already pinging with phantom twinges at the thought of bedding down with his family on the living room floor, he honestly couldn’t blame him.

“Well, if you get bored tomorrow, you know where to find us,” he said and finally let the coat go so that Bill could get back to his cozy apartment with it’s bed on a frame, with a mattress and actual bedding. He was sorely tempted to hitch a ride back with Rob as well, but traditions were traditions and he wasn’t about to rain down holy fire from his grandfather for blowing them all off just for a soft place to sleep.

In the foyer kisses hugs and wishes for a Merry Christmas to all were exchanged and once every had been embraced at least twice and kissed several times, the door was shut and the remaining members of the Durin family were left standing in the slightly overstuffed hallway.

“Who wants a second helping of cake?” Dwain asked, putting the question to everyone, but Tom sat up a bit straighter and cleared his throat meaningfully.

“Actually, hang on,” he said, catching Mags’s eye and tilting his head meaningfully toward the door. “We’ve got some gifts to give, before the kids fall asleep and Father Christmas turns up.”

His wife disappeared into the hall cupboard and re-emerged holding a bag that suspiciously looked like it was meant to line a rubbish bin.

“You shouldn’t have,” George deadpanned. “I mean, really. Shouldn’t have.”

Mags bunged an item from the depths of the bag at her son’s head. Maeve plucked out out of the air before it hit her husband in the eye. It appeared to be a cracker that had known better days, the green paper was twisted and mostly held together with cellotape.

The crackers were distributed to each person in attendance somewhat less violently as they filed back into the sitting room with mystified expressions on their faces.

“That’s it?” Phil asked, face falling. “We already had crackers at suppertime.”

Dis knew she ought to scold him, but she was rather underwhelmed herself. Tom usually gave the _best_ presents - though their grandmother of course contributed funds, they knew it was their grandfather who really did the choosing. He liked giving presents and especially liked seeing the look of wonder and joy on the faces of his grown sons when he managed to find them the _perfect_ thing, though they’d insisted he not get them anything this year in favor of spending money on the kids. Homemade crackers were a bit of a downgrade.

Tom didn’t seem to notice the general air of disappointment. “Go on,” he urged, smugly for someone who’d brought in a dustbin liner full of wrapped toilet paper rolls as presents. “Give ‘em a pull.”

The was considerably less ‘pop’ than might be expected. The paper slipped off and the cardboard rolls fell uselessly to the floor. Mags smirked, “Told you it wouldn’t fucking work.”

Unmoved her husband only winked at her and replied, “It’s the thought that counts.”

There were no paper hats inside, no stupid jokes, not even a bit of confetti for gaiety’s sake. Instead, each cracker contained a single piece of printer paper with the following printed on it:

_**Thornton O. Durin,** _

Thank you for booking your tickets through our online reservation system. Please print this email and the attached receipt with your order confirmation number for your own records. A summary of your purchase is as follows:

**3 Five-Day Park Hopper Passes Ages 3-9**   
**15 Five-Day Park Hopper Passes Ages 10 and Up**

Thank you for booking your tickets through our online reservation system. We hope you will enjoy your stay at our parks.

Have a magical day,

**Walt Disney World Resort**

There was dead silence in the living room for about five seconds as children slowly read the contents of the email and adults re-read the letter, sure their eyes were deceiving them. Then Roz screamed, _“OH MY GOD, REALLY?!”_

Phili and Killi read the magical D-world at the same time and let out whoops of delight, jumping up and down. They hugged each other. They hugged Gimli, who finished sounding out D-I-S-N-E-Y just seconds after they did and was just as excited. They hugged Roz who abandoned whatever dignity she’d cultivated in fourteen years of life and joined them in their jumping, screaming and general chaos. And finally they hugged their grandfather who seemed tickled pink by the commotion.

A commotion that his children and the vast majority of his grandchildren were not participating in.

“Funny how there’s no actual numbers on this thing,” George noted, leveling a significant look at Frank.

“Dad, you haven’t actually _paid_ for all this, have you?” Frank asked.

Grumpy!Harry was much more blunt, he gave Tom a highly skeptical look over the top of his glasses and asked him, “Have you lost your fucking mind?”

“How much did all this _cost?”_ Thorn demanded. “You can’t pay for _all_ of us.”

“Whatever happened to ‘thank you’ as a response for gift-getting?” Tom asked over his armful of great-grandchildren. “I thought I raised you lot to have manners.”

“We can’t accept this,” Dora said, rather breathless with shock. “It’s too...Tom, it’s _far_ too much - ”

“WHAT?” Roz asked, her face sliding from elation to heartbreak. “Of _course_ we can, it’s _Disney,_ Mum, I’ve _always_ wanted to go to Disney!”

“We always meant to take you lads on a holiday,” Mags shrugged. “Figured we might as well get around to it before - ”

“Are you dying?” Gav demanded, detangling Gimli’s arms from around his neck as he stood up to look his grandmother over worriedly. “Only this is something dying people do.”

Tom threw his head back and laughed, incongruously merry as the younger generation turned serious on him. “Of course we’re not _dying_ , what a bunch of pessimists you are! As for the money, there’s no use asking since I’m not telling and anyway it’s paid. All that’s left is booking the plane tickets - you’ll leave that to me as well, once everyone’s got their passport sorted. We’re going in August, that’s plenty of time to make plans to get out of work and the kids won’t be back to school for a few weeks. There’s nothing wants fretting over.”

“We’re going, Mum, aren’t we?” Killi asked, his expression as anxious as Dis had ever seen it. The large, pleading brown eyes were difficult to refuse at the best of times, let alone when saying ‘No, we can’t,’ meant denying a child the chance to go to the so-called happiest place on earth. “Please?”

“Well, kiddo…” Dis began, but trailed off when she realised she really didn’t know what to say. A part of her wanted to agree with Auntie Dora, it was too much, too generous and they couldn’t possibly go along with it because of dignity and pride and she shouldn’t take her kids to Disney until she could afford the trip herself. That was what a grown-up would say, it certainly seemed like an appropriate response.

And then there was another part of Dis, a larger part of Dis, that wanted to ride Space Mountain and take a picture with Winnie-the-Pooh and eat ice cream in the shape of a cartoon mouse head. Not very grown up of her, but the urge to join her sons in jumping up and down was getting to strong to resist, not helped at all when Cool!Harry grabbed her by the arm and whispered in her ear, “I want to go, I want to go, I want to _go.”_

“How are you meant to pay for all of this?” Owen asked. Blaise and Dwain were in deep conversation with Thorn about cost and work and it was all well and good for the kids, but weren’t they all a bit too _old_ for this?

Mags threw hands in the air, with an attitude of exasperation. She'd _told_ Tom to run it by the kids, she'd _told_ Tom to at least take stock of everyone's schedules and feelings and pocket books before he ordered the tickets, but he insisted they'd be thrilled. Though she did love being proved right, she also hated for her husband to be disappointed. He always felt badly that they hadn't been able to give their boys more treats when they were small, though he claimed he was doing this for the kids, she knew that going on this trip meant a lot to him.

“Calm down, you lot," she ordered them impatiently. "We’ve got savings.”

George snorted, “Yeah, and that money’s meant to go into your funeral fund.” When Maeve reached over and hit him, he only complained more loudly, “What? I’ve got my own funeral to worry about, I’m not paying for theirs on top of it all!”

“Bury us in the garden, if you’re so worried,” his mother replied flatly. “Look, we won’t be put on the street when all’s said and done, we wanted to give you ungrateful little brats a holiday and, touch wood, we’ve got plenty of years left to pay into the funeral fund. Money’s always been a bit tight, not as though we’ve got anywhere worth going before. We’re not dying, senile, or broke. So say thank you and stop whinging.”

A long silence followed, broken by Dwain who offered, “I’ve heard good things about the Tower of Terror.”

Roz pounced on him and threw her arms around his neck, kissing the top of his head spiritedly.  
  
“That’s more like it!” she beamed. “And if we stay the full week in Orlando we can go to Universal and they’ve got the Wizarding World of Harry Potter which is probably _amazing_ and I’ll wear my Hufflepuff socks and I won’t care if you’re all embarrassed because if we’re going to Florida, _nothing_ is stopping me from going to the Harry Potter theme park. They’ve got Hogwarts there, I might stay forever.”

“I have heard that it’s really cool,” Dis blurted out, shrugging at Thorn. “I can give notice and take the week out. And the boys won’t be in school and...y’know. Once in a lifetime trip and all.”

“So we can go?” Killi asked, crawling into Dis’s lap the second she started to nod in the affirmative so that he could give her a big, grateful kiss.

“YAY!” Phil shouted, jumping onto his uncle since his mother’s lap was full.

Thorn hugged Phil back, mentally going through a check-list of things he’d have to get done before he could pack his life up for a week to go to Disney - which he would be paying for _himself_ , even if his grandparents had purchased park admission, Thorn was determined to find some way to pay his own way. He was an adult, capable of buying plane tickets...and no, the warm, excited feeling in his chest had everything to do with the way Phili and Killi and Dis were smiling and nothing at all to do with the fact that he’d seen some video of the Main Street Electrical Parade when he was a kid and thought it looked like the coolest thing.

“Rob could collect the post,” Dis mused aloud, then grinned at Cool!Harry. “Ooh, he’ll be jealous, won’t he? We’re off to Hogwarts and Cinderella’s castle and he’s stuck here picking up our bills and newspapers.”

The look on Tom’s face became downright devious. “About that…” he began, but was cut off when Dis’s phone started buzzing on the coffee table.

She hadn’t even gotten the chance to say hello when Tara’s voice shouted at her, “HAVE YOUR GRANDPARENTS DONE SOMETHING COMPLETELY MENTAL?”

“Yeah!” Dis replied, putting her friend on speaker. “How’d you know?”

“‘Cos I just got through to my mother and she’s got these fucking tickets she’s printed up that says we’re going to - Billy! I’m on the phone! Kitty JUMP ON THE CUSHIONS, NOT THE BACK OF THE SOFA - “

There was some shuffling and jostling and the tinny screams of excited children heard before Brian picked up the phone.

“Sorry, the kids are going insane - Tara’s parents just bought us a trip to Disney over the summer and said you’re going as well. It’s like the best conspiracy ever. Hang on, Rob’s here, he wants to talk to you - ”

“AND ME AND LIAM ARE COMING ALONG,” Rob yelled, sounding just as shrill and excited as his niece and nephew. “D’YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS?”

“Er...the more, the merrier?” Dis guessed.

“IF WE STICK WITH HIM, WE GET TO THE FRONT OF ALL THE LINES ‘COS HE’S IN THE CHAIR!”

“Merry fucking Christmas,” Owen muttered under his breath, but even he couldn’t hide a small smile playing around his mouth. "This is a disaster waiting to happen."

Blaise gave him a grin, "Could be fun. Think of it as an adventure."

"I don't think I like adventures."

“You don't like anything," Blaise reminded him, patting his arm comfortingly. "Just think of it this way, of everything goes to shit, we can film it and sell the rights, make a mini-series out of it.”

Only one person in the room had not warmed up to the idea of a family-and-friends trip to the southern United States, despite the reluctant smiles, suppressed excitement and overt cheering from the children. He wasn’t called Grumpy!Harry for nothing.

“I’m not going,” he said, shaking his head resolutely. “Absolutely not, it isn’t happening.”

“But if everyone’s going - ” his sister began.

“No,” Harry replied. “In the first place, I’m not leaving the library for a week, the staff would burn the place to the ground. In the second place, I’ve no desire to spend any time in a _swamp_ in the most awful month of summer. In the third place, I’ve no desire to be surrounded by children, perverts in costumes and the rank scent of anti-Semitic commercialism whilst contracting West Nile Virus.”

“But they’ve bought the tickets!” Dora exclaimed. She did not look surprised at her brother’s refusal, only indignant.

Grumpy!Harry would not budge from his position.

“You ought to have asked first,” he said, laying the email down on the coffee table as though washing his hands of the whole business. “Get your money back or find someone else, I’m not going.”

Far from being insulted, Tom took the refusal in stride. It might have seemed as though he expected such a reaction for he turned to Thorn almost immediately and said, “What about your Bill? Do you think he’d want to come?”

Thorn’s first instinct was to say, _No, he wouldn’t, he’s got a terrible phobia of mice and animated musicals and...thong sandals. He might’ve said he loved me, but a week-long family trip will probably deliver him from that delusion but quick._

Rather than saying that, Thorn just shrugged and said, “I don’t know. Might do.”

“Ring him up,” Tom suggested, tossing Thorn the house phone. “I’ll buy his plane ticket as well, I was planning on paying for Harry anyway.”

“I’ll buy the plane ticket, Grandad,” Thorn insisted, dialing Bill’s number. Well, he would if Bill even wanted to go, which he _wouldn’t_ , because who in their right mind would want to go on a trip to an overcrowded, overpriced land of wonder with twenty-three other people?

Yet he let the phone ring and when a sleepy voice answered with a slightly dazed, “Hello?” he inquired, “Have you got a passport?”

“...Thorn?”

“Yeah,” Thorn said, _not_ putting the call on speaker, though the room had gone almost totally silent. He would have gotten up to have the conversation in private, but Killi was still sitting on him and he’d have to crawl over Dwalin, Roz and Blaise before he got to the door.

“Er...so, you remember how you said you liked my family earlier? We’ll they’ve got a proposition for you...”


	9. Carols (Fundin/Halldóra, new parents)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None, apart from a bit of parental frustration/insecurity.
> 
> The song Halldóra sings is called 'The Coventry Carol' and it's my favorite Christmas song, even if it's one of the most morbid.

_“Luly lullay, thou little tiny child  
Bye, bye, luly lullay…”_

Some mornings Halldóra woke up and was astonished to remember that she was a mother. Some mornings when she woke before her son did she wondered whether or not it had all been a dream, carrying him, birthing him, caring for him. Four months on there was still a newness to it all, a strangeness that made her life feel not quite real at times. Some mornings, as she crept over to his cradle and saw that beautiful round face, the tufts of onyx-black hair, the little rosebud mouth, she was still astonished by the miracle of him.

And some evenings she was too exhausted to feel astonished by anything. Some evenings, although Balin was fed, clean and warm, he fussed and cried, apparently determined never to sleep again. There was nothing miraculous in that.

Halldóra had not looked at a clock in hours and loathed to do so now; she would probably only discourage herself and she felt frustrated to tears already.

_“Oh sisters too, how may we do_   
_For to preserve this day?_   
_This poor youngling for whom we sing_   
_Bye, bye, luly lullay.”_

The rocking helped, at least Balin was no longer crying. For the past...the past _forever_ , it seemed, he’d only stared at her with his big blue eyes, yawning every now and again. Once she began this latest lullabye, his eyelids lowered and his mouth twitched once, then stilled.

Perhaps he was canny enough to hear the warning in it, Dóra thought deliriously. Lovely tune though it was, it had been written to commemorate the deaths of children killed centuries ago during a particularly savage conflict.

_“Luly lullay, thy little tiny child  
Bye, bye, luly lullay…”_

Humming softly, Dóra got out of the chair as carefully as she could, keeping her arms as still and steady as stone. Halfway to her feet, Balin gave a little jerk in her arms and she froze solid, staring at him without blinking, without breathing for one second...five seconds…

Twenty seconds later she exhaled and he stayed asleep. Praise the Maker above.

Ghosting her lips over his brow she laid him gently in his cot and tip-toed to her own bed. The candle she blew out and cast the room into wonderful darkness. Fundin had the night watch and the blankets were cool as she crawled under them. Little matter, now she was lying down and Balin was sleeping, so that meant _she_ could sleep and what a blessing _that_ would -

The stone door of their apartment opened up. Then _slammed._ And Balin started wailing.

With a growl of frustration, Dóra threw the covers off her bed and picked Balin out of his cot, settling his squirming little body against her shoulder. Rubbing his back comfortingly managed to lower the volume of his cries, but it was too much to hope that he’d just fall asleep again easy as anything. Distantly she realized that if Fundin was already home, it was only an hour or two before dawn.

She could cry at that thought alone, but she held back her tears and marched to the doorway that lead down the stairs to the sitting room. There she found Fundin was removing his weapons and armor, clanging them about with an unnecessary amount of noise.

“Shh!” she shushed before she could stop herself. She sounded so much like Haldr in the moment that she cringed, but Fundin did not mention the similarity, he only startled at the sound of her voice.

“Are you still awake?” he asked incredulously.

“Well, obviously,” Halldóra huffed, blowing an errant lock of hair out of her face. “He’d only just gone to sleep when you slammed the door - please just have a care next time, be _quiet_ when you come in late.”

Fundin nodded a little uncertainly.

“Sorry,” he said cautiously. “I hadn’t realized I was noisy enough to wake him.”

Halldóra breathed out a frustrated sigh, repositioning Balin in her arms in the vain hope that he’d doze off ere long. “He’d only _just_ fallen asleep…” she trailed off vaguely and the two of them stood in an uncomfortable silence.

“Was he hungry?” Fundin suggested, locking his weapons away for safe keeping.

“Evidently not. Nor soiled, nor too hot, nor too cold, I tried _everything_ \- where are you going?”

Fundin paused halfway up the stairs and stared at his wife as if she had suddenly gone mad. “...to bed?”

“No,” she shook her head back and forth very quickly. “I’m very sorry, but you’re not.”

Fundin’s look of concern turned to one of incredulity and not a little outrage. “I’ve been up all night!”

“So have I!” Halldóra shot back, lowering her head to wipe her teary eyes on the shoulder of her tunic - she couldn’t even dry her own tears, not when there was a crying child that wanted tending to, and Fundin was ready to prance off to bed without a care in the world. It seemed monstrously unfair to her. “Can’t you just take him, please, for an hour - a _half_ an hour, let me have a sleep - ”

“What should I do for him that you can’t do for him?” Fundin asked, eyeing his fussing son with great apprehension. “You just said you’ve tried everything, what difference will I make? I’ll probably just make him _worse.”_

“What?” she asked, but did not give her husband time to reply. “That’s nonsense, of course you won’t. I just need some sleep, just a nap, _please_ , you never have him when he’s crying.”

“That’s...not true,” Fundin replied uneasily. It was true, through. Whenever he held Balin and the babe started to fuss he somehow managed to pass him off to someone. It helped that there was no shortage of visitors happy to coo at him, no matter what his mood, when the sun was shining upon Erebor. When night was upon them and most of their friends and family were abed, Fundin was happy to hold their son, put him to sleep, change him when he needed it, but if he fussed or cried it was right into Dóra’s arms he went.

 _You’re better at soothing him than I am,_ Fundin always said, trying to make it sound like a compliment. Since his tears usually meant he was hungry, that was true, but when he cried for no discernable reason, Fundin never took his turn staying up with him, rocking him. Dóra hadn’t complained yet and he felt an absolutely irrational swell of irritation that she would do so _now_ , when he had just come off a long patrol and wanted to go to sleep.

“Go on, _please_ , I haven’t asked you before, have I?” she said desperately as she walked toward him, the baby red-faced and miserable in her arms. “ _Fifteen_ minutes, then, just so - ”

Truly, he hadn’t meant to. His body moved without his permission. As Dóra came close enough to hold their son out to him, Fundin took two steps up the stairs _away_ from her.

Dóra mouth dropped open in wounded shock. Drawing Balin tightly up against her chest, she stared at Fundin in utter incredulity. Here was a Dwarf who did not shirk from rusted Orcish blades and yet he retreated from a baby’s cries? He could not blame his wife for her confusion; it was incomprehensible.

Fundin was ashamed of himself. So ashamed that he snapped back, “I’m _tired_ , Dóra. I’ve _worked_ tonight, after all.”

The look of crumpled despair vanished instantly, replaced by an expression Fundin had seen on his wife’s face but rarely and not directed at him until now: fury.

“And I haven’t?” she asked, voice rising in pitch, match-for-match with Balin’s wails. “What do you think I’ve been doing since you left, braiding my beard? I’ve probably matched you step for step the number of times I’ve walked these rooms with him - every time he won’t sleep you give him to me, always to me and I’m asking you for just a few minutes on my own and you say _you’re_ tired? Why won’t you take him? What’s the matter with you?”

If Halldóra had been less tired and her tone less tart, the question would have sounded like the genuinely bewildered inquiry it was. But her nerves were all in tatters, her temper frayed and to Fundin’s ears all it sounded like was a shrill accusation that there was something wrong with him, that he was inadequate.

And, of course, he was, but rather than admit weakness, he thundered at her, “You won’t give me a moment’s peace!” in a voice so loud and booming that the walls practically shook.

Balin stopped crying. For a single instant as his eyes widened and his face screwed up like he’d tasted something bitter. Then the cries began again, louder, hurried, breathless and terrified.

Fundin did not take another step away, but it was a near thing. “What’s wrong now?” he demanded, hands gripping the rail as if he meant to tear it off.

“You _frightened_ him!” Halldóra declared accusingly, her eyebrows drawing down to an angry point above her nose. “If he didn’t have cause to weep before, he has now! What were you...Fundin?”

It was going to be a good rant. An excellent raving about parental responsibility and moderating tone of voice around little ears and how they would make enemies of half the mountain if he took to shouting like that on a regular basis. It was going to be a very good diatribe, considering the fact that her brains felt all bashed in for lack of sleep. But the words died on her tongue the moment her flashing eyes caught the mortification all over her husband’s face. Fundin looked like his wife caught him in the midst of committing a capital offense.

Dóra almost told him to go to bed. She almost moved to the sofa to lay Balin down for five minutes so that she could fix herself a pot of coffee, resigned to a sleepless night. But she did not; something told her it would not do any of them a jot of good if she did.

Slowly, deliberately, she walked toward Fundin and handed his son to him. To be more accurate, she shoved him into her husband’s arms and took a step back, leaving it to instinct to ensure that Fundin would not drop him. Instinct proved itself strong and he held Balin firmly, the tiny baby nearly disappeared in his father’s arms.

“I’m going to take a walk,” she said firmly, in a voice that would brook no argument. “I’ll leave you two to work this out between you. I will be back in half an hour. If he’s still crying, I’ll take him. But I’m going to leave for half an hour.”

Fundin swallowed and nodded. Letting out a deep breath and casting an inscrutable look up at him, Halldóra made her way to the door and left. She didn’t stop to put her boots or slippers on, but she did not return when she realized she’d forgotten them.

It was the first time father and son had been totally alone together since Balin’s birth, without Dóra or someone else an arm’s length away or in the next room. In the privacy of his own thoughts, Fundin admitted to himself what he could not admit to Dóra when she asked what was wrong. The fact of the matter was that Fundin the Fearless was absolutely terrified of the child.

Not of Balin himself, of course. He was a beautiful little boy who took after his mother, as perfect a babe as anyone could ask for. Fundin was terrified _for_ him, that in having Fundin for a father the child would be somehow ruined, that he would make a misstep in rearing him. It was a causeless fear, a directionless fear. He was only afraid that his son would suffer, his wife would loathe him and he would fail utterly in this most important of tasks.

The infant’s crying unnerved him as he never imagined anything could. It was horribly frustrating for Fundin, a dwarf of action, to love someone so much, know something was distressing him and find himself unable to do anything about it. His wife was sweet-voiced with soft limbs that could cradle Balin’s delicate little body in safety and comfort. Fundin was huge, ungainly and Balin was so small, fragile. What comfort could he give? What could he _do_ for this perfect little creature?

“I’m sorry,” he whispered as his eyes darted around the room, seeking someone else, someone better, someone who knew what to _do._ “I’m so sorry.”

Had his own father felt like this? This overwhelming helplessness, the keen awareness of his own inadequacy? Fundin had no way of knowing and no way to ask. What if the answer was no? Fundin was a father now, a fatherless father, but he had to take care of his son and he had to find his own way to do it.

Balin wasn’t crying quite so frantically anymore, he trailed off into little gulps and whimpers. It really wasn't necessary to use two arms to hold him, the little lad fit quite well in one so Fundin used his free hand to daub at the tracks tears left on Balin's face with the sleeve of his tunic.

“Shh,” Fundin hushed him. If he was Halldóra, he might have sung something, but he hadn't been blessed by the Maker with song as his wife was. All he could do was speak quietly and hope Balin forgave his earlier outburst. “Shh. It’s alright...I’ve...I’ve got you. You’re alright, aren’t you?”

And he supposed Balin was ‘alright’ in the accepted sense of the world. He wasn’t bleeding or on fire. Fundin hadn’t dropped him. He found the coral lying on the small table nearest the fire; evidently Dóra tried giving it to Balin to soothe him earlier and found it useless. Not having any better ideas, Fundin picked it up and popped the end into Balin’s mouth, the little rattle on the other side jingling for a moment, before it was stifled in his swaddling clothes.

Then, silence. Fundin let out the breath he had been holding and managed to smile, a little wanly.

“There you are,” he said quietly, making his way up the stairs to the bedroom. Quieting an infant probably ought not to have filled him with a puffed-up sense of pride, but he could not deny that he felt very accomplished in that moment. It was really too bad that he’d driven Dóra out of the house with his bad temper - ah, and then the elation burst like a bubble when he remembered that though he might not have failed at fatherhood that night, he had done very poorly at being a good husband.

It was with those thoughts laying heavy on his mind that he continued speaking to his son as he made his way to the chair by the baby’s cot.

“What were you thinking, keeping your amad up all night? That’s not very nice of you,” he whispered. The rocking chair was not comfortable, better sized for his wife than for him, but he knew Balin liked the back and forth motion. Anyway, his comfort was not as important as his son’s. “You’re very lucky to have her, do you know that? You’ve got the best amad who ever walked beneath the earth. Hardworking and _brilliant_ , let’s hope you take after her there, eh? And kind. She loves you very much. And we’d best treat her like the treasure she is.”

Once Halldóra returned, tiptoeing into the bedroom silently as she could, the bed was warm. She crawled beneath the covers and shifted so that she was lying as close to Fundin as she could be without actually touching him. He bridged the tiny gap between them to remove her spectacles which he placed on the table situated on his side of the bed with a tiny clatter. They both held their breaths as one, but Balin slept on, undisturbed.

At a small signal from his wife, Fundin scooted down on the mattress and pulled the covers over both their heads, creating a little cave where they could whisper to one another without the sound carrying outside the bed and waking Balin.

Shrouded in darkness, Halldóra nestled into her husband’s arms. One of his arms wrapped around her, holding her close, the other stroked her bedraggled curls slowly while she snaked an arm around his bare waist and pillowed her cheek on his chest.

“I’ve had a think,” she whispered softly. “I’m sorry I was demanding, I shouldn’t have pounced on you as I did the second you walked in the door.”

“Stomped in, you mean,” Fundin replied almost immediately. “I’m sorry as well, I should have taken more care, I shouldn’t have snapped at you, you’ve every right to be cross with me.”

“I’m not,” Halldóra said sincerely, squeezing his ribs reassuringly. “I think we ought to get a few things clear, though. Number one being that you’re a very excellent father.”

“I’m - ”

“Stop it,” she insisted, giving Fundin’s beard a firm, chastising tug. “Because I know you were going to say something unkind about yourself and I won’t hear it. You’re a very excellent father, number one. Number two, sometimes babies cry without any reason at all for it. And there’s nothing you can do except be patient and wait for them to come into a better temper. It’s frustrating and awful, but it doesn’t mean you’ve done anything wrong or you’ve failed or anything terrible like that. It is what it is.”

Fundin’s hand found her face in the blackness and he bopped the tip of her nose affectionately, “So, you’ve moved on from reading books to reading minds?”

Halldóra’s smile was evident though her voice was hushed, “Am I wrong? You’re so...wonderful. Don’t laugh! You are! Dutiful. Unfaltering and...and I don’t want you thinking you’re botching anything because you’re not. We’re both of us in uncharted territory.”

“You find your way a bit better than I do,” Fundin replied ruefully.

Though he could not quite make out his wife’s expression, he knew it was probably one of fond skepticism. She tended to look that way whenever he paid her a compliment. “Which of us was up all night with a fussy infant and which of us got him dropped off to sleep in ten minutes?”

“It surely wasn’t ten,” Fundin said, kissing her hair. “Much more like fifteen.”

Halldóra arched her neck back and kissed her husband on the mouth, very sweetly, “There. You see? You’re wonderful. And Balin and I are very lucky to have you.”

No more words were exchanged that night; in spite of the legendary hardiness of dwarves, the two were exhausted. As Fundin and Halldóra drifted off to sleep their thoughts were one and the same, _I hope he turns out just like you._


	10. Hot Chocolate (Thorin & nephews, nostalgia)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None, this is pure unadulterated fluff. Fluffy, fluffy, fluffy fluff. 
> 
> (I'm taking a break from writing a 12 page paper to jot this down, so apologies if it's a little slap-dash.)

Thorin was no kind of cook. He could manage to fry up eggs and bacon without burning them, meat roasted over a spit he was turning usually came out alright, but he preferred to leave cookery in the hands of dwarves who had some mastery over the craft. Any time he felt compelled to treat his sister or his nephews, he inevitably took himself to the sweets shop or Thyra's family's bakery to spend what little surplus income they boasted on treats - Dís always begging off that she was too old for sweets, but he never missed the way her eyes lit up when he managed to procure a bag of toffees with nuts. 

Little luxuries like that, plentiful beneath the mountain in fat times, were nearly as rare as mithril in the Blue Mountains. It was...paltry, almost, to regret that. To miss the markets of Erebor, carts brimming with the best of world's creations, silks, jewels, treats from far-flung kingdoms miles and miles away, but Thorin could be as petty as anyone else. It seemed a small thing when he was a child, to hold his hand out for spending money and scarper off to the market spending the whole day weaving in and out of the merchants' stalls, able to buy anything the caught his fancy. 

He did not remember them, but surely there had been some children, less fortunate than he who clung to their parents' hands and eyed the treasures he took home with him enviously, eyes quickly cast down so their mothers and fathers would not see them looking at a toy or a sweet they could not afford. Kíli, bless him, always asked, he looked to the spun sugar roses in the windows of the confectioner's with wide eyes, tugging his sleeve and pointing, "See, Uncle? D'you see? Couldn't I have one? I'd share! Cross me heart and all! Pleasepleasepleaseplease?"

It was difficult for Thorin to refuse, so he acted as though he hadn't heard, tugging Kíli gently forward even as the child's heels dug into the snow and frozen road to linger by the shop windows. Dís was better about such things than he was. When Kíli fussed over some little particular he wanted, she'd toss him over her shoulder and carry him away joking, "Why'd you want summat like that for? Too pretty to eat, you'd let it sit to admire it, then the mice would have at it!"

It only took a few such comments to make Kíli laugh and forget his wanting. Somehow, Fíli was the harder of the two to watch. During such times he gripped Thorin's hand, or his mother's, kept his eyes on the road and did not look up to see what caught his brother's fancy. 

Nostalgia, perhaps, or a simple desire to see his nephews smile made Thorin linger in the marketplace that morning and make a purchase with all the impulsiveness he thought he'd left beneath the Mountain. 

Dís was gone for the evening to the pub with friends and Thorin charged with looking after Fíli and Kíli. The two were busy in the sitting room with their toys, though the game of 'storm the fortress' they had been waging with wooden blocks and carved figurines devolved to the point that they were now hiding behind the furniture and pelting one another with their blocks instead. Until the giggles of mirth turned into cries of pain, Thorin decided he could allow himself to become absorbed in his task. 

The vanilla bean was the most expensive of the spices he had purchased and he was loathe to let any of it go to waste. He added the tiny black seeds to the pot simmering away over the fire and kept the pod for infusing in some distilled sugar-water; Thyra would find some use for it, if nothing else. Thorin unwrapped a cone of sugar and shaved a few sizeable slivers off, adding those to the pot as well, stirring the viscous brown liquid inside with a look of intense concentration on his face. He didn't notice Fíli at his side until his nephew's yellow braids ducked under his elbow and the dwarfling was standing on his toes, trying to peer into the pot.

"What're you up to, Uncle?" he asked, tilting his head all the way back to look at Thorin. "We've had supper."

"I could eat again!" Kíli declared, coming around Thorin's other side to look into the pot, having even less luck at the task than Fíli. "Smells good, whatever it is, what is it?"

"It's a treat," Thorin replied. "For good little dwarflings who get in their night things when they're told and don't dawdle."

"But we haven't been told to get in our night things," Fíli observed, all wide-eyed innocence. 

Thorin covered a smirk, badly. "Get in your night things then," he said and the two were off like shots, barreling into each other as they scrambled to be the first one through their bedroom door. It bought Thorin a few minutes more to taste his concoction, which he did with a small frown. It was the first time he'd tried to recreate his mother's chocolate recipe on his own and the results were...not quite what he remembered.

What he did remember was standing at her elbow, trying to see into the pot bubbling over the fire. _May I stir it?_ he would ask, reaching up for the wooden spoon even as she pulled it out of reach.

 _No,_ she'd reply, a frown on her lips and a crease between her eyes. _Don't distract me, I'm trying to remember how it's done._

Thorin would back away a few paces, rocking back on his heels, twisting his hands to keep them from wandering in his idleness before he spoke up again, _May I pour in the spices?_

 _No,_ his mother would shake her head, measuring out a teaspoon of this and a pinch of that. _If I'm not sure what I'm doing, you haven't a chance of making this come off well, darling. As it is we might have to toss this lot into the snow and never mention our failure to anyone._

But it was never a failure. Despite the fact that her own mother never wrote the recipe down or precisely explained to her daughter how the perfect pot of chocolate was brewed, Freya managed to pull it off with spectacular results every time.

 _May I drink it, please, Ama?_ Thorin asked at last, hopping onto a chair and holding out his hands for a mug impatiently as his mother stirred the dark liquid into thick cream.

 _Aye,_ she would smile, giving him his mug and gently clinking her own against his. _That you can do. Carefully now, don't spill._

They hadn't any cream in the larder, only milk, but Thorin poured three steaming mugs, one for himself and one for Fíli and Kíli. When he came into his room he found them sitting in bed, their legs beneath the blankets, but they were both wide awake, staring at him expectantly. 

"There you are," Thorin said, sitting on the edge of the bed, handing them each a mug of steaming chocolate. Fíli's nose came away with a spot on the end where he'd dipped it into his cup, trying to take a full breath of the rich, sweet, spicy scent wafting up at him. "Carefully now, don't spill, it's hot."

"What is it?" Kíli asked, wetting his lips in anticipation of his first sip. "It's the best thing I ever smelled, honest."

"Chocolate," Thorin replied. "It's good on a cold night. I'll warn you though, it's the first time I've made it - spare my feelings if it's rubbish, if you please."

Fíli took a careful sip, smacking his lips together as he sampled his new drink. The lad's blue eyes went wide and he took a much larger gulp the next time, burning his tongue a little, but he did not seem to notice or care. "This is the _greatest_ thing I ever drunk in my whole life," he swore solemnly. 

Following his elder brother's example, Kíli blew hard into his cup, sloshing a little chocolate over the rim, then licking it off his hands with his fingers. "It _is_ good!" he exclaimed. "Best think I ever smelled or drunk or ate or _anything_ , Uncle! And I amn't just saying so, so's you don't cry, I really truly mean it!"

"How come you never made it afore?" Fíli asked, taking another slurping sip and giving himself a little chocolate mustache in the process. "You ought to make it every day!"

"Not every day," Thorin raised his own mug and took a sip. Not like his mother's, but not bad. 

"Why not?" Kíli asked curiously. His stuffed ram was in his lap and he made a little show of pretending to let the toy have a sip of his drink. "I could take it with every meal."

"Because..." Thorin began, then paused, looking into their eager, inquisitive faces. 

_It's too dear,_ he nearly told them _Even this much is a luxury we can hardly afford._

"'Cos..." Kíli prompted him. Fíli lowered his mug from his mouth and worried his lower lip, looking up at his uncle with the tiniest bit of wise apprehension in his eyes.

"Because it's meant to be special," Thorin replied taking another drink. "And it can't be special if you have it every day, can it? Drink up and I'll tell you a story before you go to sleep."

At the prospect of receiving a story from their uncle, all the worries flew out of Fíli's face and he asked, "About Ama? Tell us one 'bout when you and Ama was little, please!"

"Please!" Kíli echoed. 

"Alright," Thorin nodded, smiling a little as he settled upon an appropriate tale. "Let me tell you about the afternoon I tried to teach your amad how to swim..."

By the story's conclusion, which involved one half-drowned and _very_ indignant little sister, one soaking-wet and frustrated elder brother and two _furious_ parents, both Fíli and Kíli were asleep, their empty mugs lined up on the bedside table. Thorin settled them down upon their pillows and wiped their chocolate-stained mouths with his handkerchiefs before he kissed them goodnight and crept quietly out of their room, leaving the door open a crack, in case the needed anything in the night. Thorin was cleaning up after himself when the door eased open a short time later. 

Dís skipped in, smiling and flushed. "What a time we had," she confided in a whisper. "Dancing all night long, Dwalin and I'll be useless at the forge tomorrow mark me - what's this?"

Her brother pressed a mug, warmed in the ashes into her hand and nodded his head at her, "Chocolate. It's not like Ama's, but it's not awful. The lads liked it, at least."

"Chocolate?" she marveled, sniffing it and staining the end of her nose, just as Fíli had done. "However did you...never mind, what brought all this on, then?"

Thorin shrugged, "Whimsy."

Dís snorted, declared that she'd never known a less whimsical dwarf than her grumpy older brother and took a sip. Licking her lips, she straightened up and looked Thorin dead in the eye. "You're right," she said. "It's not like Ama's." 

Before her brother quite realized what was happening, she pounced on him, throwing her free arm around his neck and kissing his cheek, "It's better."


	11. Warmth (Dís/Víli, cuddlefic)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** Nothing but het snuggles. They're both hairy and naked, nothing really happens. Because this is cuddlefic.

Later, if pressed, Dís would maintain that an elbow to the sternum was exactly the action one ought to expect when one buried their cold nose into her hair and pressed it against the bare skin of her neck when she was dead asleep. 

The second after she did it, she felt rather badly about it, not in the least because when Víli yelped and fell out of bed, he not only landed on the floor rather hard, but took all of the blankets with him. 

“Good morning,” Víli grinned, cracking his jaw with a yawn. 

“Is it?” Dís asked, squinting at the black windowpanes set into the wall as she bent over the side of the bed to haul her husband - ah, right, Víli was her husband now, not her suitor, not her intended, her actual proper _husband_ \- back onto the mattress. 

“Not really,” he admitted. “But good...middle of the night, eh? Good not-quite dawn.”

“Good get back to sleep,” Dís mumbled, tugging the blankets up to her chin. This time when Víli burrowed his face into the back of her neck, she was prepared for it and didn’t shove him. Probably a bad leg to start a marriage on, but she was sleepy and didn’t care about much other than drifting back to sleep.

“You go on,” Víli encouraged drowsily, wriggling lower against her, kissing her back between her shoulder blades. “I’ll stay up a wee bit longer, if you don’t mind.”

“Mmm,” Dís muttered vaguely. “Can’t get the call of the mines out of your blood?”

“S’not that,” he snaked an arm around her waist, tracing a hand against the smooth skin of her stomach, stroking the trail of hair on her lower belly with his thumb. “S’only too nice to sleep through, having a cuddle with you.”

Dís rolled over and favored him with a sleeply smile and a glimpse of heavy-lidded blue eyes.

“You can have as many cuddles as you like,” she said, kissing his nose and warming it a little with her lips. “Whenever you’d like. Well, whenever I’d like, which is most always, if you must know.”

“Ah, don’t tell me that, lass,” Víli said, running his hands over her back, outlining hard muscles and lightly fingering the line of her spine. “Not ‘less you want me to get a big head.”

Dís kissed him again on closed lips and wiggled down a bit until her cheek was cushioned against Víli’s chest, nuzzling against a mat of short, springy curls. Warm as a furnace he was, everywhere his bare skin had been covered by the blankets. Víli, Dís decided with the absolutely sound logic of the semi-conscious, was the most comfortably built dwarf in all existence. Good stout frame, thick arms and back, but with a middle that could most charitably be described as podgy. Handsomest fellow who ever hailed from the Ered Luin. 

“Hrmph.” Dís let out an involuntary noise of discomfort when the cool air of the apartment licked her toes, exposed beneath the blankets and hanging off the edge of the mattress. Víli raised his head a bit to take in the problem. 

“Socks?” he suggested, but Dís’s only response was to turn her head into his chest and frown for there was no _way_ she was rising from that bed before dawn. Not for all the gold under the mountain. Víli chuckled. 

“There, there,” he crooned, patting her head. “Stay right where you are. No accounting for you Longbeards - long legs is more like. Budge up, can you manage that, lazybones?”

She could manage a bit of budging at that. After a few seconds of shifting and rearranging of blankets, Dís was wrapped up snug and warm, her head still tucked under Víli’s chin, eyes half shielded from any hint of encroaching daylight by his beard. He chuckled again, but so quietly Dís hardly heard him, all she was conscious of was the merest suggestion of laughter, a distant rumble in his chest.

“Plan on staying there all day?” he asked. “Not that I mind, but, y’know. Breakfast and all.”

“Don’t want breakfast,” Dís said, sweeping a hand along his side, making him laugh in earnest now and bat her fingers away. 

“Hey, now, no tickling,” he chastised her, wrapping his arms tightly around her own and pinning her hands down by her sides. “No fair, that. Anyone’d reckon you were trying to be rid of me.”

Dís pulled away just enough to look Víli in the eyes. She had no way of knowing, but he thought she looked awfully fetching, her hair unbound, falling around her face in waves, her beard tangled and unkempt. And the lingering effects of sleep, slowing her movements, softening her features. Prettiest girl who ever wandered over from the East.

“Nah,” she murmured, tucking her head in the space between his shoulder and neck. “Never.”

“Well good,” Víli grinned, loosing his hold on her arms and rubbing circles against her back. “Signed a contract and all, we did. Imagine that.”

“Aye,” Dís nodded languidly. “Imagine that. What were you thinking?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Víli replied, carding his hand through all that soft black hair tickling his nose and falling in waves over the bedclothes. “Mayhap that I were the luckiest fellow as ever trod ‘neath the earth. Or that you was the loveliest lass I ever did see and I ought to charm you into me good graces ‘fore someone else got there first. Arms of steel, heart o’gold, you. Can’t see why you’d fix yourself on me, but me Ma always said I were born under a lucky star.”

“I thought she said you were Made when the Maker was in a particularly good humor,” Dís opened one eye to peer up at him, a sly little smile playing around her mouth. It was a mouth Víli decided he would very much like to kiss - and so he did.

“Hmm,” he hummed against her lips. “That too.”

They remained like that, wrapped in one another’s arms, cocooned by quilts and furs until the sky outside the window turned from black, to indigo, to sapphire to, lapis and the pair beneath the blankets showed no signs of rising. Eventually Dís stirred a little to blearily ask, “Breakfast?”

“In a bit,” Víli muttered, pulling her close and resting his cheek on her head. “S’too warm to get up just yet.”


	12. Candlelight (Thrór & Dyrfínna, religious customs)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warning:** Nothing other than organized religion.
> 
> The idea behind 'Mahalmerag' and its significance came from the article on the dwarven calendar by the Dwarrow Scholar here - http://dwarrowscholar.mymiddleearth.com/2012/04/27/the-dwarrow-calendar. Dyrfínna's name and occupation were heavily influenced/borrowed/shamelessly lifted from conversations talking headcanons with **captaintauriel** on Tumblr. I'm also mashing up about...um, three different religious traditions in here and it's less 'candlelight' and more 'oil-light,' but I'll just let you read.
> 
> Khuzdul Word of the Day - Zarârgharâf means "Altar of Offerings" (from the Dwarrow Scholar's Neo-Khuzdul Dictionary)

It felt wrong to go to temple when it was not a holy day, when no one was getting married. As if he would spoil it somehow, like looking at the charred remains of the Durin’s Day bonfires. That sour disappointment when he saw all the magic and wonder gone from them, reminding him that it was only burning wood, after all. 

So he assumed it would be with this most sacred space beneath the Mountain, but as his mother eased the gilded doorway open, revealing dark vaulted ceilings and dancing shadows that flickered against the jewels and precious metals laid in the walls, he thought with a jolt that the temple was far more imposing like this.

It was colder than usual, but not quite frigid; the fire for the Zarârgharâf was lit and the flame kindled brighter as his mother brought forth more coal to feed the flames. Thrór hung back by the lowest ring of benches nearest the altar, unwilling to come closer, but unable to stop himself from watching. His mother was a juzrâl, an attendant in the temple and a cantor at holy services and since she had not told him to cover his eyes as she worked, Thrór assumed it was alright to watch.

If he had to shuffle through the temple with his eyes closed, it might prove slightly dangerous. Even the Queen Under the Mountain could not escape all the little particulars of her craft and she was tasked with changing the candles for Mahalmerag, which Men of Dale called Yule Fest. The final week of festivities were set to begin, a long celebration of the awakening of the other Six Fathers and Six Mothers. 

Rather than a grand all-night festival as observed on Durin’s Day Eve into Durin’s Day, Yule Fest took place over a fortnight. Though the shops remained open during the daylight hours, the evenings were reserved for feasting and celebration, one night for each of the Fathers and Mothers of their race. 

But first the temple was to be prepared for observances and this year Dyrfínna decided that, at thirty-five years of age, Thrór was old enough to lend a hand. 

“Come here,” she beckoned, handing him a bucket and a tool to scrape the wax off of the candelabras. “To work.”

It was strange to see his mother, who always looked so regal, with her coils of golden hair twisted on top of her head and her beard bound out of the way. As she scrubbed at the floor her bottom wiggled in a manner that Thrór found very amusing and he giggled before he could stop himself. Dyrfínna shot him a wry look over her shoulder and remarked, “There’d be less for you to snigger at if you remembered why we were here.”

Thrór clapped a hand over his mouth and around nervously, as if afraid the Maker Himself was standing just behind him in the shadows, glaring at the prince’s lack of deference in the place where the Mountain paid homage to Him. “Sorry,” Thrór apologized, to his mother and Maker both in equal measure.

Dyrfínna smiled and winked. “The laughter of a child is music to His ears,” she remarked sagely. Then, with a quick grin, added, “So it would be to mine, if it wasn’t my rump you found so funny.” 

“You’d laugh too, if you could see,” Thrór assured her. Abandoning his rag, he got down on his hands and knees, sticking his bottom in the air and swaying from side to side. Bending until his head touched the floor, he looked at his mother from between his legs and said, “There. Only yours is much bigger.”

Dyrfínna laughed so loudly it echoed in the enormous chamber long after she gave her son’s bum a light swat and told him to carry on. 

He did carry on until his arms were sore and his bucket full of the scrapings and ends of old used-up candles. They would not be thrown away, but re-melted and used again, old made new, like Dwarves themselves when they returned to the stone. Thrór wondered aloud if there were bits of the candles burned by their ancestor Thráin I during the earliest days of their kingdom and his mother said she wouldn’t doubt it.

“That fire’s been lit just as long, it’s older than the carvings on these walls,” she remarked. Though ornately decorated, there were no images lain in the priceless mosaics around them. The rest of the mountain was full of sculptures and paintings depicting their great ancestors, but no eyes looked down at Thrór, not here. It was forbidden to place graven images within the temple proper, save those offerings meant to be burnt or pounded to dust. It was an insult to their Maker, to attempt to create life from stone or glass or wood or oils on canvas, as He had done, in this place where they came to praise His work. 

Nodding toward the fire that would glow bright until the world was re-Made or the kingdom fell, Dyrfínna added, “The visionaries say portents can be seen in the ash of that fire, if you’ve got the Sight. See anything worth telling?”

Thrór stared and stared and stared with all his might until his eyes itched, but he didn’t see - or _See_ \- a thing in the smouldering remains. Only twisting shapes of black and red and orange, beneath a cover of grey ash.

“It looks like a dragon,” he said at last, if only because his mother seemed to expect him to say _something._ Thrór was certain would please her if she thought he was a visionary and he did want to please her, he wanted to make everyone happy.

Dyrfínna was not taken in for a moment by her his transparent lie. “You think every cloud that passes overhead and every stone you tread upon looks like a dragon,” she rolled her eyes, but she did not seem too terribly disappointed as she ruffled her son’s hair. 

Grinning at her crookedly Thrór shrugged and remarked, “A dragon or an oliphaunt. Wouldn’t that be exciting?”

“I’d prefer the latter to the former, since we’re talking wishes,” his mother replied, taking her cleaning supplies to an antechamber where they would be removed and the wax melted down by the chandlers. 

“Well, oliphaunts would be of better use,” Thrór remarked, trailing after her, dragging his own bucket full of scrapings. “You could train ‘em up, use ‘em in battle, like King Josurr in Harad. Can’t do that with dragons, they think they’re too clever, but an oliphaunt’s almost like a horse, eh? A great big horse that trumpets and can squash Orcs and the like underfoot.”

Dyrfínna ‘hmmed,’ but not in a humming sort of way that meant she was trying to give the impression of attention, it was a very definite ‘hmm’ of contemplation, which meant she was thinking about her son’s words. Thrór abruptly wished he’d chosen them more carefully.

“Whatever gave you the impression that oliphaunts are less clever than dragons?” his mother asked, pausing and cleaning an absolutely monstrous chandelier that was taller than she was.

Thrór paused, thinking the matter over as he waited. “Dragons can talk,” he said at last. “And oliphaunts can’t.”

“So, wit is measured in speech, by your reckoning?”

There was no judgment in his mother’s tone, but Thrór shifted his feet and nodded slowly. “Er...I think so,” he said slowly. “Is that right?”

“How does the saying go? ‘Ma zatâbhyûrizu galabur…’” she began, trailing off expectantly.

“...zatâbhyûrizu mohilur,” Thrór finished, right on cue. “But have oliphaunts done deeds either, Ama? I don’t think so. I can’t think of a single oliphaunt named in the histories and I can name all kinds of dragons. There’s Ancalagon the Black, and Glaurung the Deceiver, and Scatha the Thief, and Melusine the Enchanted, and Endriago the - ”

“Alright, town crier, what do you mean to do, summon them?” Dyrfínna raised her eyebrows and inclined her head toward the antechamber with a touch of impatience.

“Of course not, Ama,” Thrór rolled his eyes as if the question was an obvious one. “They’d never _fit.”_

Dyrfínna laughed again, but briefly this time, her mood sobering as she swept away, leaving Thrór to jog after her. 

She was wearing what his father secretly referred to as her ‘temple face,’ her expression all serenity, like a pane of glass, showing nothing of itself, reflecting the solemnity of her surroundings, demanding attention and reverence and awe. 

“There’s still one more thing to do,” she said, taking a huge golden lampstand from the chamber into the temple proper, setting it in the center of the vast room where all would see. It was twice as tall as she was and so heavy that just looking at it made Thrór’s arms ache, but his mother did not seem troubled by her burden. There were twelve branches on either side of the central lamp, each representing one of the Fathers and Mothers of the Dwarves with Father Durin in the middle. Durin’s Day having already passed, his lamp was lighted by the juzrâl without ceremony and remained lit throughout Mahalmerag as the others were added, one at a time, until all glowed with a strong, steady flame.

Dyrfínna picked up a long golden rod with a wick on the end and set it alight with flames from the offertory fire. 

“Would you like to help me?” she asked Thrór, pausing before the tiny flickering flame touched the oil. 

Thrór nodded eagerly, but hesitated before his hands touched the carved handle. “Can I?” he asked. “Is it allowed?”

His mother nodded and removed one hand from the handle of the rod, laying her arm around her son’s shoulder in a loose embrace. “Of course,” she smiled. “If you can be reverent and turn your thoughts to the Maker and all the good things in your life that you’re grateful for.”

Nodding seriously, Thrór tried to adopt a temple face himself as he let his mother guide his hand to raise the flame together.

 _Thank you for Making me,_ he thought in the silence of his heart, so the Maker could hear him better. _And for my Ama and Adad. And for watching over Erebor. Thank you for Dísa - she’s my favorite, I think you Made her best of all. And thank you for my little brother, though he isn’t very much fun yet, I’m sure he’ll get better. And thank you for my cousins and my kin and my friends and my tutors, even when they’re cross with me. Thank you for the mountains and the stones and the earth._

The oil caught light with a warm glow and Thrór could not stop himself from smiling to see it. He was no Seer, but he was quite sure that the bright light had to be the Maker’s way of saying, ‘You’re welcome.’


	13. Home (Fíli&Kíli&Dís&Thorin, kidfic)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None.
> 
> I'm sure there's a story behind the name of Fíli's stuffed wolf - and I have no idea what that story is.

It was Kíli’s fault. 

“No, it wasn’t Kíli’s fault,” Dís hushed Fíli as she lifted his younger brother in her arms and kissed his face to make him stop crying. “Now be a good lad and stay by me.”

She held out the hand that wasn’t occupied in steadying Kíli on her hip and Fíli took it with a bit of a frown. He didn’t want to walk, he wanted to ride back to their house on Uncle Thorin’s shoulders only he couldn’t now because Kíli made him cross.

Mister Balin had left them to run to their mother and uncle at the forge. The awning was down and they were waiting for them as usual. The brothers ran for their guardians, each trying to be the first to get to Uncle Thorin because he was a little bit taller than their mother and offered a better view for whoever was lucky enough to perch atop his shoulders.

Fíli was winning by virtue of his slightly longer legs, but Kíli decided to tilt the odds in his favor, shouting, “I want _you_ t’take me home, Uncle!”

Something darkened over their uncle’s face, like a cloud passing before the sun, but it was full dark already and the moon was out. Abruptly, Thorin turned his back on them all and walked away without a word. Fíli and Kíli’s faces fell as one and their mother was momentarily torn between running after her brother and tending to her sons. She chose the latter, though her steps through the streets were so brisk treading the same path Thorin had taken through ice and snow that Fíli had to run along side her to keep up.

He wouldn’t have to run if he could use Uncle Thorin as his pony, but Kíli ruined it. Fíli wasn’t sure how his brother had ruined it, but everything was just fine until Kíli opened his big, stupid mouth.

“It is so his fault,” Fíli muttered, kicking a loose chip of ice that went skittered along the road ahead of them. “If’n he hadn’t...he made Uncle Thorin come over vexed.”

Kíli wailed his guilt and regret to the night wind and wiped his tears and running nose on his mother’s shoulder.

“Fíli,” she gave his arm a sharp tug, making his boots slip on the ice. “Enough. It wasn’t anything Kíli did - _hush_ now, my little amber-eyed darling, no one’s angry with you. Brother’s just being thick.”

“Not me!” Fíli protested.

“Didn’t say I was talking about you, did I?” Dís muttered sotto voce. Her expression and her tone softened when she looked down at the top of Fíli’s golden head, glittering with snowflakes caught in his messy braids. “Come along, I don’t want my three favorite lads in a bad temper, eh? Uncle’s not...he’s...if he _is_ vexed it’s naught to do with Kíli.”

After another great sniffle, Kíli lifted his head and looked at his mother with baleful brown eyes, still awash with tears. “P-promise?”

“I’d put it in writing if I had a free hand,” she vowed solemnly, kissing her youngest on the forehead. “No more tears. I’m sure it’ll all blow over ere long, your uncle will come out once he smells supper cooking.”

But he did not. When they returned to their flat the door to Thorin’s room was shut tight and likely locked, though neither his sister nor his nephews checked. The boys played quietly, building towers of blocks while their mother set their supper bubbling over the coals - beans, potatoes and bacon, cooked all together in a pot, with a handful of bread to sop up the juices from their bowls.

Dís set Thorin’s supper aside in his usual place at the table, but in a covered bowl, and she wrapped his chunk of bread in a piece of cloth. “Just in case he’s stubborn,” she replied softly, in the face of Fíli’s questioning glance.

They ate their supper and Thorin did not come out. Their mother ordered them to put their toys away, helped them wash their faces and clean their teeth and Thorin did not come out. When she had them dressed in their night clothes and was turning the covers down after thoughtfully heating them with a bedwarmer, Kíli grabbed her sleeve and looked up at her on the verge of tears again.

“Can I knock?” he asked, knowing enough not to burst in on his uncle when the door was closed. “I got to say sorry, elsewise what if he _never_ comes out? An’ it’s all me fault?”

“Now, what did I tell you?” Dís asked, patting Kíli’s hand gently. “You’ve done _nothing_ wrong and Uncle is not angry with you, he...he gets sad sometimes is all.”

“But _why,_ Mam?” Fíli asked plaintively. “He weren’t ‘fore Kíli shouted at him.”

Dís sighed and settled in on the boys’ mattress for what promised to be a long chat. “If I had to guess,” she replied slowly, putting her arms around Kíli who crawled into her lap immediately after she sat. “Bearing in mind that no matter what, your uncle’s moods are no one’s _fault_ \- not even his own - I’d say he was wee bit put off by the word ‘home.’”

Both boys looked absolutely mystified. 

“But why?” Fíli asked again. “This is where we live, it’s home, that’s so.”

Dís sat up against the headboard, putting an arm around Fíli’s shoulders, kissing his hair before she smiled at him sadly. “This is where we live,” she agreed. “But it’s not our home. Erebor is. The whole wide world away, but it’s the only place Uncle Thorin’ll ever call home.”

“And yours too, Mam?” Kíli asked, looking up at her.

“Aye,” Dís nodded. “Mine too. And yours, even if you’ve never seen it.”

Fíli had heard of Erebor, of course. Of how the walls glittered with gold and gems the likes of which could have paved the streets of the village ten times over. That there were shops of every kind, selling toys and sweets of all sorts, too many varieties to see and play with and eat than a pack of dwarflings could get through in a year. It was where his mother and uncle had been born and Misters Balin and Dwalin and many of their other friends and kin. Beneath the mountain where the torches always burned and it was never truly dark and the world never truly slept.

It sounded like a place from a story book or a dream. Nothing like their little suite of plaster walls and uncarved beds with windows that let the wind in through the cracks. Nothing, Fíli thought privately, like home. 

Closing his eyes, he snuggled into his mother’s side and tried to pretend he was deep underground, warm and cozy, but it was awfully hard. “What was your room like?” he asked.

“My room?” Dís repeated, as if she was asking herself the same question.

Kíli nodded eagerly, laying his head down on her chest. “Aye, Mam. Did you share a bed with Uncle Thorin?”

“No,” she shook her head and stared at the cracked whitewashed wall in front of her. Fíli wondered if his mother was having as much trouble pretending as he was. “Your Uncle was nearly grown and gone by the time I had a bed and I didn’t share with anyone. My bed was my own, but the nursery was mine and your Uncle Frerin’s.”

“Uncle Frerin what laughed loud as a cuckoo?” Kíli asked.

“And told bad jokes?” Fíli added. “And couldn’t play the pipe?”

“That’s the one,” their mother sighed. “Our room had two beds, one for each of us - I think I crawled in with him of a night when it was cold. Or my parents, sometimes, but Frerin was closer. It didn’t get cold in Erebor like it does here, there was always a fire going and the beds were stuffed with down and spread with the softest, warmest blankets and furs.”

“Did you have stuffed toys so as you wouldn’t get lonesome?” Fíli asked sleepily, reaching out blindly for the ear of his own wolf pup, Goose.

“Aye,” Dís replied, more firmly this time. “Dozens. I used to sleep with them all on my bed so that one wouldn’t feel left out, but I’d turn or kick and they’d all be laid out around me on the floor come mornings. My mother said it looked like a slaughter.”

The boys giggled sleepily. “What was your amad like?” Fíli inquired, though he already knew the answer. “Was she pretty?”

“Prettiest lady under the Mountain,” his mother confirmed. “Bonny golden hair, like yours, and a beard that she’d braid with...sapphires. It must have been sapphires. And pearls! She wore _ropes_ of them looped around her neck - ah! And one day, your Uncle Frerin was running round the room...playing hide and seek? Or I was chasing him, I don’t remember. But she came out to stop us being loud and he tripped and grabbed hold of her necklace to steady himself and snap went the necklace! They spilled all over the floor bouncing and rolling everywhere, there must have been hundreds of them, all white and round, like hailstones.”

“Oh no!” Kíli breathed. “Did he get a whallop?”

“Not for that,” Dís assured him. “It was an accident, but Ama made us - both of us, since it was partly my doing - walk around and pick up every single pearl. It took the whole afternoon.”

“I never seen a pearl,” Fíli remarked. “Are they the loveliest things?”

“They’re beautiful,” his mother replied. “They come from seashells, as I heard it, bits of dirt get stuck inside and turn lovely. Don’t ask me how, that’s a question for Mister Bofur when he’s got a minute to spend in ear-bending. They come in all sizes, big little, some look like tears. Some are white, some are black, but they all feel smooth like silk when you touch ‘em - but they go rough if you scrape them on your teeth.”

“Why’d you do that?” Kíli asked curiously. “Are they good for eating?”

Dís laughed. “Nah, s’to check and see if they’re genuine. Your Da told me that, but he might have been joking; he’d never seen a pearl in his life either.”

“But your Ma had a hundred?” Fíli lay down with his head on the pillow, still flush against his mother’s side.

“More than that; a thousand. She and all the fine ladies of the court wore pearls,” Dís told him. 

“You had a necklace yourself. Do you remember?”

The boys blinked their bleary eyes and sat up when they saw their uncle leaning against the doorjamb, also dressed for bed. Dís smiled at him brilliantly and Fíli thought, when he saw how happy she looked to see her big brother, that no pearl under the earth or under the sea could be as nice as his mother’s smile. 

“No,” she shook her head. “Probably because I wasn’t allowed to touch it, let alone wear it.”

“Oh, you wore it,” Thorin assured her, entering the room more fully and sitting down at the other end of the bed. Despite how tired he was and how loathe to leave the warm blankets for the chilly night air, Fíli fought his way out of the covers and into his uncle’s lap. The sturdy arms that went around him made him feel almost as cozy as his bed. “You wore it a few times - though I think Ama wasn’t keen on taking it out after you and Frerin broke her necklace.”

“It was restrung,” Dís retorted. “Anyway, I didn’t have aught to do with the breaking, I was only responsible for the fetching.”

“Better you than me,” Thorin smiled. Fíli was so happy to see his uncle smiling again that he forgot all about his irritation with Kíli for making Uncle Thorin’s smile go away in the first place. It seemed that Kíli had also forgotten for he was slumped against his mother again, mouth slightly open, his breathing slow and even. “Telling bedtime stories?”

“Boring them, more like,” Dís whispered. “My stories aren’t as good as yours.”

“Of course they are,” Thorin said quietly, smoothing a hand over Fíli’s hair soothingly. Try as he might to stay awake and listen, Fíli’s eyelids dropped and his grip on his wolf pup grew slack. 

“You remember more than I do,” his mother said, her voice sounding small and far away.

Fíli was shifted in his uncle’s arms, laid beneath the blankets again, his head on a pillow and his wolf tucked under his chin. Kíli was tucked in at his side and Fíli strained to hear the last snatches of conversation as his uncle and then his mother kissed him on the forehead and one of them tucked the blankets under his chin. “It’s better than remembering nothing at all.”

“That’s why you should come to supper, so you can tell them about home and not lock yourself away from us all. I could spin you a few stories about someone who did _that_ all the - ”

“Dís.”

“I’m sorry, that was a low of me, but you put us all out of sorts. Kíli thought you were angry with him.”

“I wasn’t, of course I - I’m sorry.”

There was a shuffling of feet on the floor, a rustling of clothing and a sound he would know anywhere; his mother giving someone a kiss on the cheek. “I know. It’s...well, tell them in the morning, eh?”

“Of course.”

The door eased shut and Fíli fell asleep to the sound of his mother’s voice saying, “Goodnight, brother. Sweet dreams.”


	14. Midnight (Dís&Kíli, memories)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None, aside from tipsy dwarves.
> 
> I have so many FEELINGS about DoS and this ficlet is inspired by the movie - but don't worry, no spoilers!

The moon was fat and silver, hanging low over the Blue Mountains as the final revelers made their tispy way home, thanked again and again for coming and for the presents, but _really_ they didn’t have to -

“Hush, you,” Dwalin said, clamping a hand over her mouth and kissing Dís on the forehead. “Just say thank you.”

“Mrphmm-hmm,” she said into Dwalin’s palm and he smiled broadly at her. 

“That’s more like it,” he nodded approvingly as his brother beckoned Dís to lowere her head so he could kiss her cheek.

“Our pleasure, lassie. Always.”

Dís’s cheeks, flushed pink from drinking went even more red and she embraced Balin and bid the brothers goodnight again. Somehow the floor got it in its head to shift suddenly to the left and she would have fallen over if Thorin wasn’t there to catch her around the shoulders and steady her. 

“To bed, lass,” he ordered, kissing her nose, with a smile. “One full century and she still can’t hold her ale.”

“Better than Nori - I can hold my ale better than Nori,” she corrected herself. The rest of her brother’s words drifted into her head in fits and starts. “Nori had to be carried out over Dori’s shoulder - oh. Oh, I’m a hundred. Aren’t I? And you know what _that_ means?”

“I can’t imagine,” Thorin replied and what a rotten faker he was, for he’d drunk _just_ as much as his sister, if not more, and was as much leaning on her as he was holding her up. “What does it mean?”

Dís dissolved in a fit of giggles and dropped her head onto Thorin’s shoulder, “You’re _so old.”_

Thorin burst out laughing, but tried to stifle his mirth in his hand. “Shh,” he said, though Dís couldn’t see why as he’d been the one making all the noise. “We’ll wake the lads.”

“Oh, no,” Dís shook her head, but realized it made the room swim and stopped. “They’re dead asleep...they had the right of it, I’m off to bed. G’night, brother. Sweet dreams. Thanks for the fete.”

“Anytime,” Thorin kissed her cheek and ruffled her hair fondly. “There’s no one more deserving. Joyous Name Day.”

“It was,” she said earnestly as she stumbled back to bed. “It truly was.”

Dís fumbled into her night clothes and was pulling a sleeping shift over her head when she realized that one of her sons was not as deeply asleep as she thought. Usually it was Fíli who had trouble dropping off at night, Kíli was asleep before his head hit the pillow and up at the crack of dawn. Yet it was her youngest standing on the tips of his toes by the window, gazing up at the moon and the sky.

Steadying herself against the bedpost, Dís padded across the room and leaned against the window frame, laying a warm hand on Kíli’s shoulder as she whispered, “What’re you doing, lovey? S’far too early to be watching for the sun.”

“Weren’t watching the sun, Mam,” he replied, turning toward her with a face gone pale in the moonlight. “I were watchin’ the moon. S’awful close, eh?”

Dís squinted out the window and had to admit that the moon was hanging lower than usual, or seemed to be. “That’s good,” she told him. “It’ll light everyone’s way home.”

“Is it ‘cos of your Name Day?” Kíli asked, then giggled behind his hands. “You’re a whole hunred years, Mam, s’the highest I can count.”

“Then either you ought to get to learning more numbers, or I best not get any older, eh?” she commented, ruffling Kíli’s fine hair which had slipped out of its bedtime plait already. 

Pressing his nose up against the cold glass frame, Kíli said, “You reckon there’s as many stars up in the skies as there is years you are?”

“Oh, many, many more,” Dís said, picking Kíli up and settling him on her lap. She sat down on his stool and wrapped her arms around him. “Ooh, come here now, wee one, your toes are like little ice chips!”

Kíli snuggled up in his mother’s arms, burrowing against her chest with his knees pulled up. “The stars isn’t so close as the moon, eh?”

“Nah, not so close, but they’re pretty, aren’t they? Like diamonds. Or sparks off a forge fire.”

Kíli pulled away from her slightly and tilted his head questioningly. “Fire’s hot, Mam, stars is cold.”

The room seemed to lurch and it had nothing to do with drink. Memory was a tricky thing, sneaking up on one when one least expected it. A sound, a smell. A word.

_”They’re awfully far away,” Dís observed, using her arms to hoist herself over the ledge of the curtain wall. She could see the lights of Dale, dim and yellowish in the distance when contrasted with the pure white stars twinkling overhead. “Are they diamonds?”_

_“Some of them,” her mother nodded, lifting Dís into her arms and sitting her on the edge of the wall. Freya kept her arms securely around her daughter’s waist to prevent her toppling off. “See that big one, bright as anything? That’s the Great Diamond, it points North, so bear that in mind if you’re ever outside and lost. But every once in a while you’ll see one of those little beauties go streaking across the sky. That’s no diamond, that’s a spark off the Maker’s anvil.”_

_Dís tilted her head all the way back and stared in the blackness. Freya rested her chin gently on her daughter’s head, some of the delicate silver chains she’d braided in her beard brushing Dís’s forehead. They sat in silence a while, until Dís let out a wordless exclamation of delight, pointing at the sky._

_“Look, Ama, look!” Freya looked and the two of them saw a blazing light arcing high above them before it disappeared. “What’s He Making, Ama?”_

_The wind was picking up, it was very late, so Freya lifted Dís up and kissed her cheeks before she took the child back inside. “I can’t rightly say, but I’m sure it’ll be wonderful. This is a good day for Him, I think. It was on this day fifteen years ago that you were born and He’s yet to outdo himself on that front. Now let’s go inside, you’ve presents to open, by the dozen!”_

Eighty-five years later, Dís wondered if her mother would be so complimentary of her daughter now. _No, no,_ she thought as she rose from the seat by the window and made to bring Kíli back to his bed. _Don’t think of how it ended. Think of how it began._

“They’re not cold,” Dís whispered as she lay Kíli down beside his brother. “Some of them are red-hot, sparks straight off the Maker’s anvil.”

“Are they?” Kíli asked drowsily. “What’s He Making? Something grand?”

“Aye,” she rested her head against Kíli’s briefly before she kissed him goodnight. “Something wonderful. Think on that and have sweet dreams.”

“Alright, Mam,” he murmured. Kíli rolled over and clung onto Fíli’s arm, nuzzling his head into Fíli’s shoulder. His older brother was fast asleep and did not seem to notice, but the corners of his mouth turned up when Dís leaned down to kiss him as well. “Happy Name Day.”

“Thanks,” Dís replied. She sat on the edge of her sons’ mattress and watched them for a long while before she dragged herself off to her own bed. The sheets were chilled and she never slept as well alone as she did with another at her side. She hadn’t had that in over ten years, but tried to banish those thoughts from her mind. It really had been too nice a day to mind about the midnight cold.


	15. Roaring Fires (Frerin, wassailing in Erebor)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warning:** (Historically accurate) underage drinking. And bawdy songs.
> 
> More Mahalmerag fun! The two songs are "The Lusty Young Smith," by Thomas D'Urfey (I freaking love this song.) and "Wassail, Wassail All Over the Town" aka "The Gloucestershire Wassail" by some medieval person, I dwarfed it up a little for fic purposes.

The Mahalmerag celebrations were underway and it was on the sixth night of their festival (to honor the Mother of Clan Blacklock) that the Men of Dale came to call. All the fires had been lit to blazing as winter bore on and on. The wind whistled outside the mountain and the snow fell steadily, but the residents of Erebor were as snug as could be in their city under the stone.

The great hall where the King held his portion of the feasting was so crowded and so hot that most of the royal family and courtiers had shucked their outer garments off and kicked them under tables or cushioned their seats with them. Clad only in tunics and trousers and belts, they toasted their fellow dwarves, far away, sang songs of honor to their Mother and the Maker of them all. The punch was sweet, made of rum, the sugar from which came from cane cut in the South and went down easy as clean well water. 

Frerin quite liked it, but he was only allowed to have a tiny sip from his mother’s glass, just to taste, and had to content himself with his usual small beer for the evening. He would have been jealous of Thorin and Dwalin for they got their own glasses, but they were so small and their contents drained so quickly and not refilled that he could not bring himself to cry foul. Anyway, even if he was of a mind to shout his jealousy, the task would have proved quite impossible, his mouth was full of cakes for the greater part of the evening.

Ordinarily his mother would have taken his plate away and warned him about the perils of tummy aches, but Freya was in a _very_ merry mood indeed for her glasses of punch never went empty. Frerin was thus able to gorge himself on sweets to his heart’s content - until Dwalin and Thorin started nabbing treats off his plate and putting them on theirs.

“You’re littler than us,” Thorin explained, spewing honey and walnuts from his mouth with every words. “We need more food than you do.”

Dwalin’s mouth was too full for talking so he just nodded vigorously and stabbed stewed raspberries, making the juices go everywhere all over Frerin’s plate and he was _just_ about to complain to Missus Dóra since she was Dwalin’s Ama and could make him mind, but his own mother decided to join in the singing and distracted the whole table with it. 

“For the king!” she announced with a saucy look and a wink. “I know this is one of his own favorites! ‘A lusty young smith at his vice stood a-filing...’”

Thrór, in his customary seat at the head of the table let out a great hoot of laughter and applauded, though the song was barely begun. His wife, Queen Sigdís laughed as well and pounded her fist on the table, shouting, “Go on, go on!” Frerin had long since stopped trying to count the number of times her cup was refilled. The dwarves of Erebor were proud to say their Queen could out-bellow, out-fight and out-drink any dwarves who walked beneath the earth.

Freya was all too happy to oblige them, even though her husband had his head in his hands and groaned with exaggerated disapproval, “Not _that_ one!”

“His lay hammer lay by, but his forge still a-glow,” Freya sang, shoving Thráin’s shoulder playfully as she stood up on her seat and shoved her plate out of the way so she could stand atop the table. The others cleared their own plates and goblets from her path when it became clear that her object was the Lady Halldóra. Freya held out her hand expectantly and went on, “When to him a buxom young damsel came smiling…”

Halldóra took her hand without a second thought and sang, their high and low voices blending marvelously, “And asked if to work in her forge he would go - Rum, rum, rum!”

The hall filled with the voices of two-hundred dwarves repeating, “Rum, rum, rum!” 

“Rum, rum, rum!” The ladies chorused again, gleefully.

The very ornaments upon the walls shook and the ancient suits of armor that stood perpetually at attention around the perimeter of the room rattled when the same assembled dwarves, including the servants, stopped in their eating and drinking and conversations to stomp, slam their hands against the tables or tap out the rhythm with their bugs as they heartily echoed, “Rum, rum, rum!”

“Rum, rum, in and out, in and out, in and out, ho!”

Halldóra and Freya ran down the length of the table, each seeking another partner. Halldóra made for Heidrún whose beard ornaments jingled cheerfully as she allowed herself to be hauled onto the table, singing the next line at the top of her most excellent voice, “I will, said the smith, and they went off together, along to the young damsel’s forge they did go…”

There was little doubt who the object of Freya’s chace was; in a trice she had her younger cousin Frigga standing alongside her, tipsy and tripping over platters of sweatbreads, but she continued heartily, “They stripped to go to it, t’was hot work and weather, they kindled the fire and she soon made him glow. Rum, rum, rum!”

Thráin made a bit of a show of covering his youngest son’s ears, but the singing as so loud that Frerin heard every verse. He didn’t see why a song about a mister and a missus forging together when her husband’s tools were all worn out, but everyone around him seemed to find it extremely funny. Well, everyone but Thorin and Dwalin who exchanged mystified glances with one another. And Balin who had his head in his hands and looked just as mortified as Frerin’s father. Or mayhap he’d simply had too much to drink. 

“When the smith rose to go  
Quoth the dame, full of sorrow,  
‘Oh, what would I give  
Could my husband do so?  
Good lad, with your hammer  
come hither tomorrow -  
but pray, could you use it  
once more ere you go?’”

Mugs were toppled and plates kicked over as the royal dwarrowdams used the table as their dancing arena, but no one really seemed to mind. Especially not Mister Fundin, Frerin noted, who got up from his own place to snatch his wife off the tabletop and kissed her on the mouth in front of everyone. Freya half fell, half slipped off the table and right into her own husband’s lap. Thráin only blinked at her.

“Can scarce lift my hammer, can I?” he asked flatly.

Freya smiled and tilted her chin up to kiss her husband, “Come along, now, it’s only a song - I’ve got a smith all my own, haven’t I?”

Thráin’s smile was slow to spread, but it was a fully-fledged grin ere long. “That you have,” he said and kissed her as well and as deeply as Fundin had his own wife.

Frerin’s face must have showed disgust because when Frigga came down off the table, she sat by him and ruffled his hair, “Ama and Adad turning your stomach, are they?”

Nodding, Frerin leaned closer to her and confided, “That’s _nasty.”_

Frigga laughed and took another drink of punch, “It surely is - well, _I_ think so, but different folks half different taste after all, and no accounting for them. You may change your mind, or you may not, you’ll be in good company either way!”

Frerin wrinkled his nose and shook his head, “No, no kissing. Not on the lips, you get hair in your mouth!”

Frigga laughed again and was about to reply, when one of the guardsman tapped Thrór on the shoulder and announced that the Men of Dale wished to convey the greetings of the season. 

Thrór beamed and bellowed down the table, “Up you get - those that can stand, if you can’t, no trouble, they’ll be back again next year!” 

“Time for bed,” Freya remarked, holding her arms out to Frerin as she and her husband got up to make their way to the main gate. Her youngest son dove beneath the table at the announcement and hid while his mother crouched down and tsked at him, “Come now, you ought to have been fast asleep ages ago!”

“I’m not sleepy,” Frerin declared, as if the argument would make a jot of difference. It never had before when he voiced it, but there was a first time for everything. “Just a _wee_ bit longer, Ama? Can I see the Men come to call?”

“No, no, you’ve been up long enough, now enough of this. Come out and I’ll - ”

“I’ll take him,” Frigga assured her cousin, slipping beneath the table and crouching beside Frerin underneath. “No trouble!”

Although Frigga had no dwarflings of her own, she was trustworthy and had been left with Thorin and Frerin before to mind. Freya seemed relieved to leave the arguing to someone else and immediately nodded her agreement that her cousin should put her son to bed. 

“If you’re sure,” she said, jogging off to join the rest of the court marching for the Gate. “Be sure he cleans his teeth and washes his face!”

Frerin was on his hands and knees on the ground, ready to crawl away from her, but Frigga grasped his belt and left him unable to escape. “Ey, now, don’t you know your Auntie Frigga?” she whispered in his ear, eyes sparkling in the darkness. “I said I’d take you - I never said _where,_ did I?”

After an exchange of conspiratorial grins, Frerin wiggled out from his hiding place beneath the table and allowed Frigga to bear him upon her back as they slipped from the hall out of a less crowded side hall.

The main entryway was filled with roast meats, the fruits of the Men’s harvest and confections of every size and description. Frerin’s belly was more than full, but he could not help twisting his head around and looking with covetous eyes on the sugared flours and little gems made from almond paste and the smell of pears cooked in wine made his nose twitch. 

A round shoulder bumped up against Frigga’s arm as they entered the hall and a stout hand tousled Frerin’s hair. A dwarrowdam clad in the blue armor of the Mountain Guard, unhelmed, with a stern expression, but kind eyes stopped them before they’d managed to get near the gate. It was Rúna, one of the senior guardswomen and a particular friend of Frerin’s grandmother, the Queen. “Here, now, isn’t it past time for the wee lad to be abed?”

Frigga winked at her and hefted Frerin up higher on her shoulders, “I won’t tell if you won’t.”

Rúna laughed and waved them along, “Go on with you, I heard there’s Ironfist fireworks this year, should look a treat.”

The entryway was crowded, but a small space had been cleared near the front where Thrór stood beside the fire burning in the center of the room, heating the space and casting bright light against the gold shimmering in the walls. Through the thick gilded door, singing could be heard - quite a crowd too, to reach their ears through all that metal and stone.

_“Wassail, wassail, all over the town_  
Our toast it is white and our ale it is brown  
Our bowl it is made of the white maple tree  
With a wassailing bowl, we’ll drink to thee!” 

Wassailing, they called the tradition. The people of Dale would go to the homes of the Lord to beg a drink of mulled wine in exchange for a song - in exchange to _go away_ Frigga muttered to Frerin. Then the Lord himself, his Sovereigns and their families would make the long walk to the Lonely Mountain, the road lighted by torches and thoughtfully cleared if there had been any snowfall, to pay their respects to the King Under the Mountain. They usually expected more than a gulp of warm wine and an orange slice to make it worth their while and Thrór never disappointed. 

“Now?” Rúna asked, once three verses of the song had been gone through and they seemed ready to start in on a fourth.

Thrór shook his head with a mischievous smile, “Let them keep at it a bit more, I like to see how long they can go before they start over from the top again.”

_“And here’s to the good folk inside your deep halls_  
Blessings on the master, his kin, one and all!  
A cup of good beer we pray you draw near  
And this jolly wassail, it’s end you shall hear!” 

With an approving laugh, Thrór gestured for the gates to be opened, “Let them in, let them in, the poor sods have suffered enough!”

A blast of icy wind blew back the braids of the assembled dwarves and made the youngest children shiver. Frerin caught sight of Thorin and Dwalin trying to hide behind their fathers and he tightened his hold around Frigga’s neck; she made a worthy shield from the wind. 

In they pour, bundled from their fur-trimmed boots to their fur-lined hats. Gertheon, Lord of Dale, shook the snowflakes off the shoulders of his cloak and rushed forward to embrace Thrór with all the feeling of a dear ally. Frerin knew that his grandfather liked this particular Lord, they were almost hewn from the same stone, as alike in temperament as a Dwarf and Man could be. Big hearted, hard workers who put their people first, always. 

“How was the journey?” Thrór asked.

“Cold!” Gertheon laughed. “‘Least I’ve got a warm horse ‘neath my rump, the wife and children had to come along in a miserable carriage.”

“That’s not a fair trade,” Sigdís observed. “Surely your lad is old enough to mount his own horse, aren’t you, Girion? How old are you now, forty? Forty-five.”

“Nine, milady!” the lad piped up from behind a scarf which had been twice wrapped around his neck. “That’s just what I said, didn’t I, Da? I _told_ him I was old enough to ride!”

“Ride here, maybe, but you’d fall asleep in the saddle on the journey back,” Gertheon replied. “We’ll all perish of frostbite, mark me, if we don’t get something warming to drink. Come along, good King, let’s have a drink!”

Thrór did not need to be told twice. He seized a poker from the great fire and struck a cauldron of spiced ale, thickened with eggs, that was to be ladled out for Men and Dwarves alike. Frerin saw Thorin and Dwalin peek around their father’s sides, tugging their sleeves, asking for a drink. Thráin and Fundin exchanged a glance, looked down at their sons and shrugged which seemed to be all the permission Thorin and Dwalin required before they lunged forward, hopping up and down on the balls of their feet, asking for cups of their very own.

“Can I have a drink?” Frerin tugged on Frigga’s hair insistently. “Can I, can I, can I, can I, can I?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Frigga glanced at him over her shoulder impassively. “Can you?”

Frerin immediately changed tactics. “May I, may I, may I, may I, may I? Please?”

Snorting, Frigga edged her way closer to the cauldron and said, “How about we share, eh? Just a nip to warm you up before bed.”

Frerin’s face fell slightly, “But I want to see the fireworks!”

“If you can keep your eyes open, you can see the fireworks.”

It was easier said than done. Frigga let Frerin have a few sips from her mug between her long draughts. It tickled his throat, but it warmed him up inside - and also made him very, very sleepy. “Time for bed?” Frigga teased as Frerin’s head slumped against her shoulder. 

Frerin fought to keep his eyes opened and tried to swallow a yawn, but hiccuped instead. “No,” he maintained stubbornly. “Fireworks.”

“Alright,” she nodded, draining her cup. “Let’s go outside.”

It was very cold an Frigga wrapped Frerin up in her own coat. He was so grateful for the warmth and so tired he did not think to ask her whether or not she’d be cold in only her tunic. Far from trying to hide amongst the crowd, Frigga deliberately sought Freya out and took her place next to her as everyone gathered ankle-deep in the fresh snow to watch the lights flash above their heads. 

“I thought I told you to take him to bed,” Freya remarked, but not crossly. She seemed a little confused, as if unable to recall exactly what she’d said.

Frigga shrugged, “He wanted to see the fireworks, I didn’t see the harm.”

Freya tilted her head down at Frerin, his heavy eyelids that he stubbornly kept cracked so that he could see. “No, no harm, I suppose,” she remarked, rubbing a hand over his back. 

The lights burst over their heads, a riot of sound and light and color. Frerin’s mouth dropped open as he opened his eyes wide as he could, not wanting to miss a single spark. But the flesh proved weaker than the spirit and it wasn’t long before he was dozing on Frigga’s shoulder, oblivious to the pops and bangs that made the children of Men and dwarflings around them shriek and clap their hands. 

When he woke up in the nursery, warmed by a fire burning low in the grate, lit by a single candle that was at Thorin’s bedside, Frerin struggled to sit up, unsure whether it had all been a dream or not. 

_“Thorn!”_ he whispered the lisping approximation of his brother’s name that had been one of his first words and evolved into a rare nickname for his older brother. _“Thorn!_ D’you see the fireworks?”

“Mmm-hmm,” Thorin nodded sleepily, rustling through his blankets until he found a well-worn stuffed wolf whose battered left ear wound up clamped firmly between his teeth as he lay his head on the pillow. “It was pretty. You would’ve liked it.”

Frerin frowned and tried to roll over, but found his arms pinned. Had it been a dream? It seemed so real, the colors in his memory so vivid - but as he struggled out of his bindings, he found he was still wrapped up in Frigga’s overcoat and it was with a triumphant grin that he fell asleep to the memory of burning lights in the sky and the warmth of a steadily burning fire.


	16. Jumpers (Balin & Dwalin, kidfic time travel)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Ratings:** General Audiences **Warnings:** This fic is an absurd tribute to my love of both de-aging and time travel fics. Basically this is what happens when I don't know enough about knitting to write Ri family sweater stories. As for how it fits the prompt, think of this story as being a jump through time. And a jump from POV to POV. Lots and lots of jumping.

It should have been the state of Balin that shocked them. The sudden appearance of a half-grown dwarrow lad with an unruly mop of curling black hair falling into a face sporting a nose it hadn't grown into, in their snowy bearded sage’s place should have knocked them clear out of their boots.

By rights, Balin ought to have received the greatest number of gasps, more than his share of open-mouthed gawping and the whispered insistence of, "That's not - it isn't - it just _can't be."_

Yet it was Dwalin who attracted the lion's share of stares. Whose enormous brown eyes went wide and frightened to find himself in a strange place, out of doors, not tucked warmly into his bed beneath the Mountain where he was meant to be. Whose round cheeks dimpled as he smiled unexpectedly, spying the familiar figure of his older brother amid the frightening surroundings. Who _hid behind Balin_ when Thorin took a half-step toward him, face ashen with shock.

To be fair, Balin drew a few surprised blinks himself as he tucked Dwalin firmly against his side and drew a knife from his belt, eyed each one of the dwarves around him calculatingly and demanded to know what was going on - albeit in saltier language than most of the Company expected him to employ.

Óin alone seemed unmoved and unimpressed. "Language, coz," he spoke up sharply and Balin's grip on his knife went slack, his ears and eyes telling him two very different things. "You'd think with a mother like yours, you'd run your mouth with words you picked up in the library, not the gutter. Now put that damned blade away before you hurt yourself and I have to stitch you up."

Balin stared a beat longer. Then sheathed the knife. "There's plenty of ha'penny words to pick up in the library," he said finally. "Or haven't you met my uncle?"

"Ah, he's decided to be sensible," Óin smirked, noting the sheathed knife. "Thank the Maker above. Now." Óin stood with his arms akimbo and tilted his head up and Gandalf with an air of great expectation, "What's all this, then?"

The wizard seemed to be as stunned as the rest of them. He coughed once and, realizing that was not an acceptable reply, said, "...for the moment, I am not prepared to say."

A snort of disapproval and a shout of, "Typical! _Typical!"_ erupted from Dori who raised his arms to the heavens and continued shouting. "What next, then? Are we all to turn to dwarflings in our sleep and suffer the dangers of the wild, unarmed, helpless? When will you have, _answers?_ With all due respect. Of course."

This time, when Gandalf recommended making their way to the Hidden Valley, Thorin was not immediately averse.

* * *

"Are we dead?" was the first thing out of Dwalin's mouth when he found himself lying in one of the long corridors of Erebor, adjacent to the Guard's quarters.

"No," Balin replied immediately, getting to his feet with all due haste. In the first place, he was quite sure his body had not been new-Made because his legs still ached from a long day of riding. In the second, though Erebor was a grand kingdom, he had to believe that what awaited them in the hereafter was unimaginable to mortal minds.

The next thought that ran through Balin's mind was that he would have done better to remain lying where he was; it was suddenly very clear that his knees were not quite going to support him when the shock began to set in.

"I've read of visionaries dreaming themselves forward in time," Balin muttered in the interest of keeping his sanity. "But not _backward."_

* * *

It was only when they readied the ponies for travel and Dís called out to her brother for a knife to adjust the cinch on her saddle that Dwalin finally poked his head out from where it had been hidden in his brother's side. With eyes that grew wide and round, he stared at the tall, short-bearded dwarf who went by his cousin's common name.

"Thorin?" he asked, trying wriggle away from Balin to get a closer look, but his brother held the hood of his tunic tightly in his grasp and did not let him go, though his mouth fell open as he gaped.

Thorin froze. Aside from his initial dumbstruck staring, he steadfastly avoided looking at the two dwarflings. Oin appointed himself their unofficial minder and naturally Fíli and Kíli were _fascinated_. They alternated between asking Gandalf questions the wizard could not - or would not - answer while trying to speak to Balin and Dwalin at the same time.

The latter task proved even more frustrating than the former, Dwalin had gone selectively mute and Balin gave them only the shortest replies possible - and not too politely either.

"How old are you?" Kíli asked, fingers itching to reach out and pull on Balin's curls, to watch them spring back to form.

"Fifty-seven," he replied sourly, automatically swatting Kíli's fingers away. "And keep your hands to yourself - how old are _you?_ I'd say seventy-five or thereabouts, but you act like a dwarfling of twenty."

Fíli had a good hard laugh at that one, once he got over the surprise of steady, patient Mister Balin being _moody._

Dís was the one to shout at them to clear off and stop bothering them. She smiled at Balin and tried to get a better look at Dwalin, but the former only stared at her insolently and the latter burrowed closer into his brother's side. Thorin did not lift his head or divide his concentration between his pony and his suddenly young cousins.

Only now Dwalin was looking at him, had called him by name and Thorin could not ignore him any longer.

It was a few short strides and then he stood before the dwarfling who tilted his head all the way back to stare at him. Thorin knelt down to spare Dwalin’s neck, realizing with a jolt that it was the first time in all his life that he had ever been taller than him.

“Aye,” he nodded. Balin’s grip on the back of his brother’s tunic went slack and Dwalin stumbled forward, having been straining against him. Thorin automatically reached up to catch him, his hands engulfing Dwalin’s shoulders.

Dwalin eyes traveled from Thorin’s large hands up his arms to the fur that made his broad shoulder seem wider than they already were. Finally he looked into Thorin’s face, squinting and staring, evidently trying to find a trace of his friend somewhere in his unfamiliar form.

After a long examination, Dwalin nodded, satisfied. “Your nose is too small,” he announced and Balin snorted, trying to cover a laugh. “When’d you get so big though? You aren’t supposed to be taller than me, that’s not right.”

Thorin smiled at last and Dwalin returned the expression automatically. “It’s not,” Thorin agreed. “And I’m not. Taller than you, not...generally.”

Dwalin looked immensely relieved. “Oh, that’s good,” he grinned. “Elsewise how’d I look after you?”

A low chuckle began in Thorin’s chest, but it was aborted when Bofur made a noise of frustration and marched up to Gandalf. None of the Company had ever seen him in such a tizzy, confusion, disbelief and not a little fear warred on his face for dominance. Even his own brother was giving him a strange look.

“Right,” he announced, his voice strained. “I don’t claim to know ‘bout magic or whatnot, but it’s clear t’me there’s something strange afoot, stranger’n we’ve reckoned, something’s been done to make us go all addlebrained and I’m the only one what sees it!”

Gandalf tried to calm him, “I quite agree that this turn of events is...rather startling. However we will soon enough be among folk who have seen - ”

“Don’t care what they seen,” Bofur shook his head, the flaps on his hat twitching nervously. “Nah, s’the eyes that are the trouble! You tell me that lad over there’s Balin, well, sure, could be. But _that_ ,” he pointed an accusatory finger at Dwalin, who Thorin still knelt before, a bemused expression on his face, _“that_ right there? Isn’t Dwalin. Not a chance.”

All of them, eleven dwarves, two dwarflings, one hobbit and one wizard, did nothing more than stare at Bofur who, having said his piece, folded his arms and looked resolute, though his eyes did dart over to glance at Dwalin suspiciously every now and then.

“You’ve been too much in the sun,” Bombur diagnosed his brother uneasily. “Made you come over funny, best have a drink o’water - ”

“Nah, y’see, you’ve been taken in!” Bofur declared, begging off the waterskin.

“Of _course_ that’s Dwalin,” Óin scoffed, peeling his gloves off with the clear intention of feeling Bofur’s forehead and the back of his neck for signs of heatstroke. “Of all the ridiculous - come on, off with the hat now - ”

Bofur merely tugged his hat down to his eyebrows and shook his head.

“Alright, I’ll humor you,” Dís piped up, placing a hand over her mouth in a gesture that looked thoughtful, though she was probably just trying to hide a smile. “Why isn’t it Dwalin, then? Can’t say I trust your authority, you not having known him when he was small - ”

“There!” Bofur exclaimed, gesticulating wildly with his left hand while his right kept his hat firmly clasped to his head. “That, right there, lass! You’ve got it in one - Dwalin was never _small_. The Maker smote the ground with his hammer and out sprang Dwalin the giant from the rocks, full-grown and holding his axes, already dripping orc-blood from the blades.”

Balin, who displayed an impressive restraint throughout the entire diatribe, scowled now and took hold of his brother’s arm, pulling him close alongside him again.

“You’re an idiot,” he announced shortly and though the rudeness of his words could not be denied, no one reprimanded him for them - to be fair, that might well have been due to the fact that none among them thought they had the right to reprimand the wisest member of the Company. Even if his wisdom was currently shrouded beneath a veil of irritability.

By contrast, Dwalin seemed _enchanted_ by Bofur’s retelling of his origin, however flawed it might have been. “Axes?” asked eagerly, twisting his head round this way and that to catch sight of them. “Where?”

“Nowhere for you,” Balin informed him firmly, tweaking the child’s nose. “You’re too small for heavy weapons.”

With a loud sound of protest, Dwalin pointed at Bofur and said entreatingly, _“He_ said I was a giant!”

Dís snorted and elbowed Bofur hard in the side. “See what you’ve wrought?” she muttered, but didn’t take her eyes of this new, definitely not giant-sized version of Dwalin.

No doubt she’d seen paintings or sketches of him when he was a child and she certainly remembered growing up alongside a Dwalin who was a good deal narrower in the shoulders than the dwarf Bofur had been acquainted with these long years, but even in her earliest memories of him, Dwalin was always on the cusp of adulthood. Certainly he bore little similarity to this chubby-cheeked dwarfling whose head, if she stood close to him, might just about reach her hip. She wasn’t close enough to know for sure, but Dís was fairly positive that if she allowed herself to get within arm’s reach of Dwalin, she’d scoop him up in her arms and would be hard-pressed to let the little fellow down.

As it happened, Thorin beat her to it.

Balin had been trying, not very patiently, to explain to Dwalin that although his grown-up self might wield multiple axes his _current_ self was far too young to try and he’d only get hurt and what _would_ their parents say if he was returned to them missing an arm?

“Oh, wait,” Balin said before his brother had the chance to reply. “I know the answer to this one already - I’d get the blame, for you’re my responsibility, aren’t you?”

Dwalin stuck out his lower lip and pouted. “But _Ba-_ lin,” he began, then stopped when Thorin came to stand over them.

“We’ve got to be on our way,” he announced. Dwalin nodded readily enough, but Balin looked rather nervous at that pronouncement, though he did not argue. “The wizard - Gandalf believes he knows someone who can...set this all to rights again, but we must ride to find them. Dwalin, you can ride with your brother, if you’d like. Or with me.”

The speed with which the child turned his back on Balin and shouted, “You!” ought to have insulted his elder brother, but Balin was only grateful to leave the minding to someone else.

It was difficult to think of the tall, imposing dwarf before him as Thorin, for he looked almost nothing like his brother’s quiet (but mischievous) little counterpart. It was easier to imagine he was handing Dwalin over to their cousin Thráin for looking after. Very easy, if he closed his eyes; father and son had the same voice.

Dwalin lifted his arms over his head and rose up on his toes expectantly. Thorin wasted no time at all in picking the dwarfling up and setting him on his hip. Dwalin seemed pleased with his newly elevated position and gripped the fur that lined Thorin’s coat tightly. Fili and Kili dogged their uncle’s heels, declaring that they were each _impeccable_ riders and so _careful_ , couldn’t wee Mister Dwalin ride with one of _them?_

“You can ride on your own?” Glóin asked Balin, a smirk lurking behind his beard when the lad went red around the cheeks and ears.

“Of course I can!” he snapped immediately. For goodness’s sake, he might be _younger_ than these dwarves expected him to be, but he wasn’t a _child._ That honor went to his brother, placed the saddle by their entirely too-tall cousin.

Dwalin, bless him, was as resilient as ever a dwarfling could be. His initial fright was gone and he seemed thrilled to bits to being going for a ride. Patting the pony’s mane he asked Thorin what it was called and giggled approvingly when he was informed that her name was Minty.

His little brother was still being gawped at by the other dwarves in a way that made Balin feel uncomfortable. Just what had Dwalin gotten up to when he grew up that convinced other dwarves he’d never been a child?

Glóin helped Balin re-adjust the stirrups on the pony that was evidently his - he tried not to look too impressed by the saddle-mounted writing desk, but he couldn’t help his mouth from twitching up into an ironic little smirk. His mother might find herself less down on ponies if one was outfitted like that for her use, he’d have to mention it to his father when he saw him again.

If _you see him again,_ a dour little voice whispered warningly in the back of Balin’s mind. He tried to shoo the thought away. He might not understand what had happened, why he was in the middle of the wilderness with his kinfolk who were all so very much older than they ought to be - now that he thought of it, their explanation that they’d been on a ‘hunting trip,’ seemed to have been announced all too hastily and by too many speaking over each other to ring with believability - but he had to hope the wizard or his friends could sort it.

The stirrups needed very little re-adjusting, Balin noticed when he shook himself out of his dismal thoughts and concentrated on the present. He frowned at them; evidently he was not destined to grow very much taller.

“Need a hand?” the red-bearded dwarf at his side asked with an air of unmistakable glee all about him. “Or can you manage on your own, coz?”

“Oh, no,” Balin said with slowly dawning horror, looking up at the dwarf, eyes not wanting to believe what his mind told him must be true. “You aren’t…”

“Glóin,” he announced smugly. “At your service.”

Balin hoisted himself up into the saddle, trying to reconcile the image of his squalling baby cousin with the handsome, fully grown dwarf who was _also_ taller than him. The effort left him frowning as he prodded his pony forward with a nudge of his heels. Either the Maker was laughing at him today or he was suffering from a very bad dream.

Kili rode by swiftly, then reached out at the last moment and gave Balin’s hair a good hard tug.

 _Laughing,_ Balin thought to himself, disgruntled. _Definitely laughing. Mayhap if we make a good joke, He’ll see us safely home._

* * *

Once Balin and Dwalin were more or less convinced that they were neither dead nor dreaming, the fact remained that they were both in for a very unpleasant day if they were discovered lurking around the city decades older than they had any right to be.

“Gandalf will have to sort this out,” Balin shook his head at long last, resigning himself that short of seeking the wizard out wherever he might be lurking, there was next to nothing he and Dwalin could do to set the world to rights. Truly he could not work out exactly what they’d done to find themselves in this predicament in the first place.

And it was a predicament, to be sure. Many a time both thought that there was nothing they would not do to return home to Erebor, but this was nothing like what they imagined. In Erebor they were, everything was so heartbreakingly perfect, each hall they wandered, each statue they passed or priceless work of art laid in the walls was _exactly_ as they remembered. But this was not the Erebor they were meant to return to. Their home was laid waste to, a burned, desolated place, but it was theirs nonetheless. This place was a dream.

Dwalin let out a snort of disgust at his brother’s assessment of the situation. “I wouldn’t trust him to sort _nails_ let alone...whatever this is. Careful!”

Seizing hold of Balin’s arm, Dwalin pulled them into an alcove as they once _again_ encountered a figure familiar to them.

Perhaps dream was being too generous. This constant ducking into dark corners and holding their breath, praying to go unnoticed, had the flavor of a nightmare and the corridors were filled with ghosts.

Loni passed them by, whistling cheerfully as he made his way to the guards’ training grounds. He was one of their father’s dearest friends, a fellow guardsman and particular favorite of Dwalin and Balin both when they were young. He married a little later than most and joked that he cut his teeth minding the two of them - their father always rolled his eyes and said he might have spoiled them, but ‘minding’ seemed to fall by the wayside when Loni came to call.

His wife and two of his children died in the mountain. The middle child, a girl, survived the dragon with her father, but after he was slain at Azanulbizar, she was taken in by relatives and the last time Balin heard of her, she was married and living in the Iron Hills. He’d fallen out of contact with her decades ago, but could picture her clearly in his mind’s eye. She had her mother’s brown hair, wound into thick coils, and her father’s freckles.

“This is getting ridiculous,” Dwalin groused once Loni disappeared around the corner and the two of them could exhale again. “Can’t walk ten feet without running into someone we know - no telling if they’ll recognize us anyhow.”

Balin shot his brother a skeptical look. “You’re the very picture of our father, I think they’ll notice.”

Dwalin rolled his eyes, “You’re overstating the matter, I’m not the _very_ picture.”

Ignoring his brother’s protests, (for beard and eye color aside, in his opinion, Dwalin and Fundin might as well have been hewn from the same stone), Balin cast his eyes around, as if the answers to all the questions he had might show themselves on the walls. “We know where we are,” he muttered to himself. “The question - ”

 _“The_ question?” Dwalin interrupted. “You’ve only got the one, then?”

“The _most pressing_ question is _when_ are we?” Balin finished. “I’m not about to ask anyone the date, they’ll think I’m mad.”

“Or an overworked scholar,” Dwalin commented idly, swirling his head around this way and that. “Isn’t there somewhere else we could go? We’d be more anonymous in the middle of the damned marketplace than - what is it?”

Balin paused, froze, really, in a such a fashion that Dwalin knew the cogs in his mind were turning. “Scholars,” he repeated, then chanced a brief flash of his teeth up at his brother. “You are a genius.”

“Thanks,” Dwalin nodded, hurrying along as Balin made his way down the corridor. “What have I done?”

“Given me a notion to hie away to the library,” his brother said, nodding determinedly. “No better place for a body to go when it wants to get lost.”

The main library was a hive of activity. Every which way there were dwarves bustling back and forth, arms full of books chattering at long tables, jealously guarding their finds in private carrels.

“So what’s the plan?” Dwalin muttered, edging closer to the nearest range of shelves. “Hide in the stacks and _wait_ for - ”

A laugh from the enormous circular desk that dominated the center of the room cut Dwalin off mid-sentence as all the color drained out of his face.

They might not have known the day, they might not have known the year, but Balin knew the season. Winter. And his mother was working in the library.

* * *

Lord Elrond received them cordially, a quickly raised eyebrow the only sign that he found anything unusual about the dwarves’ current predicament. Thorin hoped that meant he had a solution that could be procured quickly and painlessly, but he thought with a quickly sinking heart, it might simply be that the Elf lord was so ancient that it was impossible to surprise him.

Let it be clear that Thorin was not _happy_ to be begging the Elf lord for help, but this was a very different matter than granting him access to the secrets of Thorin’s people. This was a problem far beyond his capabilities or those of his kith and kin to remedy. Thorin did not trust Elves, was wary of placing with well-being of his cousins and dearest friends in their hands, but he could not think of any other solution.

Of the Company, he was one of the few who managed to keep his head. Thorin did not attribute that to any particular strength of character on his part. His memories of the time when he was as young as Dwalin appeared to be were hazy, they were there and he certainly knew that Dwalin had not been birthed from the rocks at Bofur seemed to have deluded himself into thinking. Balin’s disposition did not trouble him overmuch; many was the afternoon he contributed in driving his older cousin to the very bottom of his well of patience - which did not run nearly as deep as an adolescent as it did when he grew up.

Even so, it was one thing to remember and another to lift Dwalin from the saddle - so small and light - and place him upon the walkway only to have his hand immediately clutched by a much softer one.

Dwalin craned his neck and peered at the valley below. “That’s a long _long_ way down,” he observed. “Hold my hand, don’t fall off.”

“You won’t,” Thorin said, giving his hand a reassuring squeeze. Dwalin squeezed his hand right back.

“I know,” Dwalin declared confidently, all smiles. “I was talking about you.”

Someone nearby laughed - Fíli, from the sound of it. Thorin too could not help the chortle that escaped his throat at the declaration, but he soon schooled his face into a disapproving scowl and flung Dwalin over his shoulder. The dwarfling shrieked with laughter and struggled to get away, but Thorin held firm.

“I think I’ll manage,” he said, falling to the back of the group, which was being led up a short flight of stairs by one of Lord Elrond’s aids, a dark-haired, dark-eyed disapproving looking fellow. “I don’t like your odds if I toss you over the side.”

“You wouldn’t,” Dwalin wriggled until Thorin was holding him more naturally, then threw his arms around his neck in a tight squeeze. With his face nestled in Thorin’s neck, buried in furs and hair he added, “I’m your favorite.”

“Hey!” Kíli jogged over to them wearing an immensely put-out expression. “‘Scuse me, Mister Dwalin, but _I_ happen to be his favorite.”

“Begging both your pardons,” Fíli elbowed his way into the conversation, a grin that he probably thought passed for charming plastered on his face. “I was here first, so that makes _me_ the favorite.”

“What?” Kili teased, elbowing his brother in the ribs. “Age before beauty?”

“Beauty!” Fíli hooted, pulling Kili’s nose. “That’s a laugh! You’ve a face only a mother could love - there you are, you can be Mam’s favorite and I’ll take Uncle Thorin.”

“Hate to break it to you lads,” Dís cut in, coming between her sons and effective cutting off what promised to be a rather childish tussle of nose-slapping and braid-pulling, “but I think, _I’m_ Thorin’s favorite - though I’ll accept second favorite, for the time being.”

She smiled at Dwalin and he lifted his head and smiled back at her, albeit a little tentatively. “You’re their Ama?” he asked shyly.

It had been impossible for him _not_ to become acquainted with Fíli and Kíli on the way to Rivendell. They rode their ponies alongside Thorin’s, riding recklessly, performing as many silly tricks and stunts as they could before their uncle told them to stop lest their mounts break a leg. Dwalin learned quickly that Thorin was their uncle and they were his nephews, but this pretty lady was certainly not little Frerin all grown up. Unless she was Missus to Frerin’s Mister, but Dwalin had not seen any other dwarf with black hair and blue eyes, save Thorin and Fíli and Kíli’s Ama. Maybe Frerin stayed home.

“I am,” she grinned and stuck out her hand, “I’m called Sigdís, after my grandmother, your auntie, but you usually call me Dís. Or else you call me a menace, but I like Dís rather better.”

Dwalin shook her hand with a respectful, “Nice to meet you, Missus Dís,” before he crowed at Thorin, “You get a _sister?_ Lucky! Do I get a sister? I want a sister. If I don’t get a sister may I borrow _your_ sister? Please?”

“You certainly may,” Dís informed him, ruffling his hair. “Whenever you want me, I’m yours for the borrowing.”

Dwalin giggled again, partially because he decided that he liked Thorin’s sister very much and partially because Thorin was making a very funny face, like he’d taken a drink of something and was about to spit it out.

“Stick with me a little longer,” Thorin requested, swinging Dwalin up onto his shoulders. “If you’re to be my favorite, after all.”

Balin was walking near the front of the group between Óin and Glóin and he grabbed his eldest cousin’s arm to get his attention.

 _“Rivendell?”_ he hissed once, then again when Óin brought his ear trumpet out and Balin had to repeat himself. “That’s clear over the Misty Mountains, what are you all _doing_ out here? And don’t tell me it’s a hunting trip because I know that’s a lie.”

Óin frowned, but it wasn’t a frown of frustration as missing half a conversation, merely resignation; he’d heard every word and even if he hadn’t, Glóin’s dismayed face told him all he needed to know about Balin’s having seen through their little ruse.

“Too bright by half,” Glóin remarked disapprovingly. “Gimli’s got five years over him and he’d never have questioned that story.”

“I hope he would - whoever he is - when he realized he was being told you’d packed up a baker’s dozen ponies and gone halfway across the continent for a hunting trip,” Balin remarked acidly. “What reason have you to be this far West? No one from our court’s gone so far from home for so little cause in...in…”

“In your case, about sixty years, Master Balin.” Lord Elrond peered over his shoulder at the young Dwarf and Balin stiffened, though the Elf’s expression was kind. “The King, your uncle, paid a visit to my home two years before you were born. I remember the occasion well. And your lady mother and lord father.”

Balin too remembered his lady mother and lord father and knew that, no matter how angry he was with his cousins, they would expect him to mind his manners when speaking with so venerable a figure as Lord Elrond.

“My mother speaks of you with the highest regard, sir,” he replied respectfully, though the furrow between his dark eyebrows did not smooth exactly.

There were things they weren’t telling him, things that were being hidden. Where had those Western Dwarves come from? What were they doing here? Balin was especially suspicious of the Broadbeam with the plaits who seemed so alarmed by Dwalin. That one, Bofur, was marching straight ahead and seemed to be trying hard not to look back at the sound of two of the younger dwarves, (the pair who acted like jesters on their ponies) laughing and joking with Dwalin, who once again managed to find himself in Thorin’s arms.

The sight almost snapped him out of his ill temper. It was a miracle his younger brother learned to walk, Balin reflected and almost smiled at the thought that crept into his mind as Dwalin was lifted onto Thorin’s shoulders. The way he had been charming grown dwarves since he was an infant, once someone got a hold of him, they never wanted to put him down. At least he was being well looked-after. That was a small blessing amid all this strangeness.

“Balin,” Thorin’s voice was suddenly in his ear and his hand on his elbow with a grip like iron. “Your mother was...friendly with that Elf?”

From the tone of Thorin’s voice it was clear that the idea of friendship between their races was so foreign to almost be unfathomable.

“I don’t know that anyone can be friends with an Elf,” he replied honestly. “Not really, they’re too...remote? If remote’s the word I want, it’s good as any. Er, but Ama talks about him sometimes - not _all_ the time, but when there’s cause to speak of him. She says he’s wise and kind and she respects him. That’s all.”

Thorin nodded shortly and they entered an open-air courtyard were tables with low seats were being set for them. Balin paused on the threshold, hovering uncertainly. Something about Thorin’s words struck him as being odd, out of place, wrong somehow, but he didn’t have time to dwell on it, for Dwalin decided to make a nuisance of himself.

Thorin had set him back on his feet, but he was showing extreme reluctance to leave his side, though Fíli and Kíli promised that they were infinitely more fun than their uncle and he ought to sit between them.

Balin crouched in front of his brother almost immediately. “Dwalin,” he said and his brother met his eyes reluctantly. “Come along, you can’t sit with Lord Elrond - anyway, you won’t be able to see over the rim of the table.”

Dwalin didn’t say anything in response, he only looked up at Thorin, then back down at the floor. His brow was furrowed and there was a frown on his lips, but he did not seem angry, precisely. He looked worried.

Balin hunkered down further and chuffed his chin. “Where’s my brave lad, then?” he asked, very softly, uncomfortably aware of all eyes on him. “Don’t let’s be difficult. You don’t want Lord Elrond writing to Ama and telling her that you were a pest, do you?”

“She certainly shall not be informed of that,” A deep, even voice from high above Balin’s head made both brothers stare up, a little cowed. “For your brother is nothing of the sort. I would be most pleased to have you at my table - both of you.”

Dwalin smiled happily at the Elf and took Thorin’s hand again, leading him to the tall chairs surrounding the much higher table. Balin followed with a little reluctance that he hoped was not too obvious; he would much rather dine among fellow Dwarves, however unfamiliar they were, to Elves who were utterly foreign. Their language he could learn, their history he could study, but to converse and eat with Elves was something very different than hearing tales of them.

The idiot with the hat looked very appealing, by comparison. No more so than when one of the Elves helpfully placed a well-stuffed cushion on the chair he was given, between Thorin and the wizard. Balin’s feet did not touch the ground and he scowled, the unpleasant expression deepening when they were served plates of greens and nothing else.

Dwalin was more vocally dismayed. “‘Scuse me,” he piped up from the place he’d claimed on Thorin’s lap, reaching his arm as far as it would go to give the Elvenlord’s sleeve a hearty tug. Amazingly, Lord Elrond gave the boy his full attention with an undeniably fond expression.

“Have you got any ham?” Dwalin inquired. Then, indicating Thorin, added, “It’s his favorite.”

“Alas, no,” Elrond replied even as Thorin insisted that fetching different foods wasn’t necessary. “The only game my people have hunted of late is Orcs.”

The conversation was not one either Balin or Dwalin could contribute to, centering as it did around Orcs and the dangers of the road. Dwalin was using Thorin’s knife and fork to cut mushrooms into smaller pieces, piling them up on the plate to make a crude approximation of a fortress while Balin dutifully attempted to choke down the pathetic supper.

They were granted a reprieve when Thorin rose abruptly from the table. Balin hopped off his own chair and took hold of Dwalin’s arm when it appeared that his little brother was going to follow Thorin, who did not look as if he wanted company at the moment.

Truthfully, Balin was alight with curiosity, if he couldn’t control his impulses, he might have run after Thorin himself, to ask him what they were all truly doing out there in the wilderness, as Lord Elrond had. But, despite the opinions of the dwarves around him, Balin was not a child and could control himself. In any case, there was a more urgent matter that wanted tending to.

Muttering apologies, Balin tugged Dwalin into a corner behind one of the harpists, keeping one hand firmly around his wrist so he didn’t try to wander off again.

“You need to stop clinging to Thorin,” he said firmly, but quietly once Dwalin tilted his chin up to look at him. “He’s grown, he doesn’t need you to speak for him or hold his hand.”

“I’m not trying to speak for him,” Dwalin protested, twisting his arm to pull away from Balin, but his brother held on with a strong grip. “I’m not! I’m just trying to cheer him up.”

That gave Balin pause. “Cheer him up?” he asked, confused.

Dwalin nodded, craning his neck to look at Thorin, but his back was to them. “He’s sad,” Dwalin explained. “He always looks sad, even when he’s smiling.”

Balin hadn’t noticed. Any tension he perceived in Thorin he assumed had to do with the fact that he and his brother were not the sons of Fundin he was accustomed to. On the contrary, he thought he looked quite taken with Dwalin and was about to accuse his brother of imagining things, when that mad dwarf jumped on a pedestal and began singing a silly tune.

Thorin half turned to listen and Balin saw then that his brother had been quite correct. Though his lips were upturned, his eyes were shadowed. Sad.

It was an expression Balin had seen before, he realized. Not on Thorin, of course, or even Thrain who was more straightforward about his unhappiness. No, Balin remembered how startled he was when Thrór, who had the easiest laugh and most cheerful countenance of any he’d ever met, began to use smiles that didn’t reach his eyes.

* * *

“No,” Dwalin said, not in disbelief, but stark refusal. “Absolutely not. We’re leaving, come on.”

“Don’t be…” Balin trailed off, not quite sure what he did not want his brother to be. Ridiculous? Was it ridiculous to prefer not to be in company of one’s beloved dead? Balin didn’t think so, but he couldn’t help himself turning around, looking toward the desk...and there she was.

The sight was so familiar and so very foreign. His mother was leaning on one arm against curving edge of the desk, her back to the door, but Balin caught the golden glint of the firelight off of her spectacles, saw the white quills stuck haphazardly in her braids. One slender hand was clasped over her mouth and she glanced over her shoulder to see if she was being glared at by any who expected quiet. The press of her fingers left a smear of black ink on the tip of her nose.

Halldóra was younger than she had been when last Balin had set eyes on her, at least he thought so. Her face was slightly fuller, her dark hair shone only with hints of gold, not silver. Perhaps he only perceived a difference because he was so much older.

Dwalin hardly looked at her before he strode away on his long legs for the door, hurrying out as fast as he could without tripping over anyone and drawing attention. Balin almost called after him, but bit his tongue when he realised he couldn’t. He almost _ran_ after him, but for the fact that his mother was speaking again and he couldn’t bear to go.

“Can I help you?” she inquired of a dwarf who stepped up to the desk and if it had been a shock to hear her laugh, it was nearly agony to hear her speak. She sounded different here than in Balin’s memory. Closer, louder, clearer. More like a bell and less like an echo.

Despite himself and his better judgment, he edged closer, pretending to be busy sorting through atlases which lay on thin, flat shelves in a wide cabinet. The librarian she had been conversing with, a dwarrowdam named Gílla, took one of the carts away to shelve its contents. Balin’s heavy heart lightened when he saw that his mother was left alone. If another librarian, a different girl had been with her, nothing would have stopped him from following his brother right out the door.

“I’ve come to lodge a complaint,” the dwarf informed her angrily. Halldora’s pleasant expression never wavered and after a short pause, he went on. “Your facilities are hardly what they were described to be from the stories travelers tell of the libraries of Erebor. How many book wheels are you possessed of?”

“Twenty-five,” she told him promptly. “What was that complaint you mentioned?”

“Twenty-five,” he repeated crossly, folding his arms over his chest. “Twenty-five. The dwarves of the Seven Kingdoms travel here year after year and you have _twenty-five_ book wheels. Did you know they were all in use?”

“I did,” she nodded, smiling at him. “A very excellent way to consult multiple volumes at once - though a good sturdy table won’t go amiss, even if it is a mite less convenient. As it happens we’ve several very fine examples of cabinetmaking behind you, if you’d just - ”

The dwarf blew out a great gusty sigh, but Halldóra’s pleasant expression was unwavering. It always impressed Balin when he was a child how his mother could keep her face so still, her smile so constant. As though she was carved of stone.

By the Maker, what was he _doing?_ Dwalin was right, he ought to have followed his brother’s lead and run for the door the moment he heard her laugh. Yet with the other dwarf looming over her, he found he could not make his feet take him away.

“I did not traipse all the way up here based on rumors of substandard facilities,” he growled. “If you ask me, another dozen wheels would only just about satisfy the demand - ”

“And if you would like to craft them for us, we would be very happy to have them,” Halldóra smiled brilliantly. “You would naturally be rewarded for such generosity with a suitable plaque - however even if the donated items were made by your own hands or paid for with your own coin, we would still have to abide by our queue, wouldn’t we? It’s only fair. So. Shall I take your name or would you prefer - ”

“I would _prefer_ to speak to someone who shows me a little less cheek!” the Dwarf exclaimed, slamming a hand on the tabletop. A few of the surrounding scholars raised their heads in irritation, but Halldora kept right on smiling.

“Well, as you’ve already been disappointed once today, but I suppose the lesson bears repeating,” Halldóra replied cooly. “You can’t always get what you want.”

Letting out a snort like a rampaging bull, the dwarf shouted, “I want to see someone of standing - ”

“You’ll be hard-pressed to find one who outranks the Lady Halldora in this library.”

Balin wasn’t sure how he’d managed to go from staring sightlessly at an atlas to standing before the desk beside the irate scholar. All these years they thought Dwalin was the impulsive one.

The dwarf rounded on him, but some of the fire went out of the expression as Balin’s words fell on his ears. “The...beg pardon, could you give that name again?”

“Halldóra Fundinul,” she supplied, her smile widening into a grin as she inclined her head, the very picture of ink-smudged graciousness. “Court scribe of Erebor and occasional volunteer librarian. At your service.”

The dwarf turned very white. And then very, very red.

“Apologies, my lady,” he bowed so low the top of his head touched the desk. “I had no idea I...well. I apologize for my...comportment.”

“Apology accepted,” she replied sweetly. “Would you like to be added to that queue now?”

The dwarf replied that he would and Halldora removed a quill from her braids and recorded his name in one of the many ledgers kept behind the central desk, then pointed out a table that got very good light in a little-trafficked corner of the library.

If Balin was as quick and clever as he was reputed to be, he would have walked away. Would have gone straight after Dwalin, though the Maker alone knew where his younger brother had taken himself off to. But he stayed exactly where he was, unable to take his eyes off her, the sparkle in her eyes, the curve of her nose, the shape of her smile. His heartbeat picked up and his chest felt tight. He didn’t realize she’d spoken to him until she came out from around the back of the desk and stood smiling up at him, only inches away.

“Just got in?” she inquired cheerfully. “You’ve got that look about you.”

“Look?” Balin repeated, dumbfounded.

Halldóra’s smile turned conspiratorial as she removed her spectacles, wiping the lenses off on her sleeve. “Aye, the look of, ‘Mercy me, where on earth am I?’ How were the roads? Dry, I hope.”

“Dry,” Balin confirmed, nodding a fraction of a second too late for the motion to appear natural. “Er. The journey was pleasant enough, all things considered.”

“Of course,” Halldóra replied, replacing her glasses. Her habitual squint became exaggerated as she looked Balin up and down. “Iron Hills? I do apologize for prying, but I can’t help thinking I’ve seen you about before. And it’s only natural to assume you’d come from close by, arriving so late in the season - would you prefer I left you in peace?”

“No, no,” Balin shook his head all too hastily. “Pardon me, I am a bit...dazed, I suppose. It has...been many years since I’ve come to Erebor. I was beginning to think I’d never make it back.”

“Never?” Both of Halldóra’s eyebrows rose in surprise and she looked Balin over closely again, paying particular attention to his eyes, it seemed. It took all of his considerable willpower not to look away. “But you’re not - ah. Well, little matter, you’re here now. Is there anything in particular that you need? How many years has it been? It can’t have been so many as that, I’ve only been court scribe these past sixty together.”

 _Sixty,_ Balin thought numbly. _Which would make me fifty-seven, if that...she has so little time left._

“It feels like a century gone by,” Balin replied honestly. His throat grew tighter and tighter with each passing moment and his eyes were burning with the effort to hold back tears, but he would not cry, he would not reach out for her, he would do _nothing_ but ape the motions of ordinary conversations for as long as he could bear it.

“Well, welcome back,” his mother said with a warm smile that set his heart to breaking.

* * *

Lord Elrond could do nothing for the children that night, but assured them that he would have the answers he sought when the morning came. The Company grew restless following their supper of greens and there was talk that Bombur had a few sausages left of their rations to set to roasting, if they could find wood enough to light the fire.

When the option of ‘refreshing themselves after their long journey’ was offered, the Company agreed that a scrub would be nice, and, of course Fíli and Kíli thought that Lord Elrond’s fountains would be just the place for it.

“What d’you _mean_ you’ve never climbed to the top and made your way to the pool from there?” Kíli asked the dark-haired Elf who was evidently meant to be their minder while Elrond and Gandalf consulted with one another. “Not even once?”

“No, Master Dwarf,” Lindir replied stiffly. “I have never immersed my person in the fountains in all of my life, furthermore I do not believe - ”

“What good are they?” Fíli asked, tossing his tunic off over his head and letting it fall upon the ground. “Just look at it come down! Wouldn’t even need to scrub behind your ears with all that pouring on you.”

“Best make the effort regardless,” Dís said, tugging at Fíli’s left ear and eyeing it critically. “Bilbo could start a proper garden back there, if he was of a mind to.”

That got a good hearty laugh from the Company, even Bilbo who seemed much cheered by the prospect of a wash - though he agreed to accompany Lindir to the guest quarters for a heated bath, rather than making himself merry in Lord Elrond’s fountains.

Once Kíli shucked off everything but his trousers and small clothes he made a beeline for Dwalin, holding his hands out to pick the dwarfling up. “Want to have a go down the fountains, Mister Dwalin? Can you swim?”

Dwalin nodded eagerly. “I can swim, my adad taught me,” he declared, taking a half-step toward Kíli. His right hand was held in Thorin’s left, but Thorin’s grip slackened the second Dwalin began to walk away from him. Dwalin tilted his head up at Thorin curiously. “Aren’t you coming?”

Thorin shook his head and would have dropped Dwalin’s hand entirely had the child not clung to his fingers, determined not to let go. “No, I’ll wait a bit. Go on, I’ll stand by.”

Dwalin hesitated, torn between Kíli’s outstretched arms and Thorin’s slack grip. “That’s alright,” he said, stepping back to stand by Thorin’s side. “I don’t want to.”

Kíli’s smile dimmed a little and he dropped his arms, but perked up again as he jogged off toward the fountain. “If you change your mind, just shout for me, Mister Dwalin!” he called as he ran off in pursuit of Fíli, shedding more layers as he went.

Balin was reluctant to let his little brother out of his sight for more than two minutes, but as a lad of fewer than sixty years, he could not help but be tempted by the whoops and shouts of glee from Fíli and Kíli as they made use of the fountains of Rivendell in their own particular way. With a strict promise that Dwalin was to scream if _anything_ went wrong (Dwalin was loud and Balin was quick on his feet), he jogged off toward the fountains himself, to the delight of the youngest members of the Company.

Ten minutes later and Dwalin was watching them all with envious eyes, wriggling impatiently in his boots and glancing at Thorin from time to time with badly disguised longing. Thorin crouched down beside him so they were more of a level; Dwalin still had not let go of his hand. “You can join them, if you’d like,” he said nodding toward the fountains. “I’ll watch. You don’t have to stay by me all the time.”

“‘Course I do,” Dwalin replied simply. “You’re my best friend. Everyone else has gone off and if I go with them, you’ll be all alone. That’s not right.”

Thorin was just about to reply that it was alright if he was left alone, really, but Dwalin spoke up again, once he’d looked around to be sure that no one was about who could overhear him, “Have you still not learnt to swim? I won’t laugh at you if you haven’t, promise.”

The question startled Thorin into laughing again, but he was quick to assure Dwalin that he _had_ , in fact, learned to swim when he was a lad.

“Then why don’t you want to go play in the fountain?” Dwalin asked. “Everyone else is doing it - even Óin and Óin’s even older than _you_ are! Maybe it would cheer you up.”

“Cheer me up?” Thorin echoed, his brows furrowing. Dwalin raised a small hand and passed his fingers over Thorin’s forehead, trying to force the wrinkles out.

“There!” he declared. “See, Balin didn’t believe me when I told him you were sad about something, but it’s there all the time. What happened? Can I help? Is it only something that the grown-up me can fix? Is that why you’re sad, would you rather have the grown-up me?”

A furrow between Dwalin’s own brows began to form as he stared at Thorin with wide, nervous eyes and a small frown twisting his mouth. Bofur might have been worrying himself into a tizzy, trying to reconcile the old Dwalin with the new, but Thorin suffered no confusion on that account. Harder, angrier, more sorrowful, they _all_ were that, but Dwalin always cared so much. Not for all the world, but there were no lengths he would not go to for the sakes of those he loved.

Beyond duty, it wasn’t honor alone that made him sit in silence when Thorin was too melancholy for speech, it wasn’t his dference to his king that sent him down to Thorin’s room, defying locked doors and angry words to drag him outside, to give him occupation or take him drinking. And when it was all too much, when Thorin fell into Dwalin’s arms and clung to him as though his friend was the only anchor he had in a storm, Dwalin never pushed him away.

Smaller, rounder, more sweet-voiced this one was, but those warm brown eyes and that broad smile were constants.

“You’re not so different,” Thorin managed a smile for the lad. “Taller, perhaps, but the same in essentials.”

“Oh, good,” Dwalin nodded with obvious relief. Without a thought or a care, Dwalin closed the distance between them and hugged Thorin as close and hard as he could. “I’d not want you to be sad on my account.”

“Don’t worry,” Thorin assured him when Dwalin pulled away. Smirking, he ruffled the hair atop Dwalin’s head and said, “That’ll never happen.”

The grin Dwalin favored him with was nothing short of brilliant. “Good,” he nodded firmly, then tugged Thorin’s arm with both hands. “Want to swim now?”

Thorin got to his feet and nodded, “Alright. Can’t let Fíli and Kíli have all the fun, can we?”

* * *

No matter what the opinion of the world was about his elder brother, at the moment Dwalin was willing to swear that Balin was an utter idiot.

Mustn’t be seen, mustn’t be caught, and what was he doing? Standing in the middle of the thrice-damned library to stare at their mother. The idea that he could just _stand_ there and look at her without making a sound, without wandering over to talk to her on the pretence of borrowing a book or needing directions or some equally daft excuse...

Either Balin was out of his mind (not impossible, given their circumstances) or he was stronger than Dwalin could ever hope to be.

It was awful, this place. Every corner held a thousand memories, some that were long forgotten coming back as clean and clear as freshly sharpened steel. Dwalin didn’t need this, he really didn’t. Must’ve had a fierce look about him, those few folk he did passed scurried out of his way like mice in the path of a cat. Suited him perfectly well, there wasn’t a soul he wanted to see or talk to. For all he’d dreamed of home over the years, his skin was crawling to have been returned to it in such a way. All the wizard’s doing, he had no doubt of it. Once he was back where he belonged, he’d wring the bastard’s skinny neck before the daft old Man could raise that gnarled stick of his to fend him off.

Aye, now that was a thought. The wizard _would_ be the one to have had his hand in this. If Dwalin was a wagering dwarf (and he was) he’d bet it had something to do with getting Thorin to take them all off to that Valley he was forever prating about. The wizard might not be able to out-stubborn a dwarf, but Thorin would probably be swayed when he thought his kin were under an enchantment that could only be reversed with Elf-magic.

Dwalin was so furious and so intent on his course (which was to get as far away from the library as it was possible to go without actually leaving the Mountain) that he did not realize he was on a collision course with someone coming out of one of the antechambers until the two ran into each other. Both dwarves staggered, but neither fell.

“Excuse me,” Dwalin growled at the same time as the other straightened up and asked, “Where’s the fire?”

Dwalin could swear his heart stopped. _Where’s the fire, lad?_ his father would say as he snagged the back of his tunic to prevent him running out of the house without his coat.

 _Where’s the fire?_ he’d smirk when Dwalin made some blunder, going too fast, anticipating too boldly in the Guard’s practice arena.

 _Where’s the fire?_ he’d shout as Dwalin and Thorin raced one another in the fields, pushing their ponies much faster than the poor beasts wanted to trot. _Careful, laddie, you’ll break your head and then your mother will have mine - and that goes double for you, Thorin!_

For one truly horrible moment as father and son locked eyes, Dwalin was quite confident that Fundin would discern everything and...and he did not know what would happen then. A tiny, childish part of him that he thought burned away by fire screamed, _Fix it, Da! You can do anything, can’t you?_ but that voice was barely discernable over the thudding of his heart in his chest.

But Fundin showed no sign of recognition, just a little chagrin. “No harm done,” he said at last, stepping out of the way to let Dwalin pass him by. When the other dwarf made no move to go anywhere, Fundin cocked his head at him and asked, “Are you turned around? Only you look a bit lost.”

 _Right,_ Dwalin thought, stealing himself. _Open your mouth, you idiot. Talk. Then get out of here, if you know what’s good for you._

“Er...a bit lost, aye,” Dwalin nodded, then stopped and stiffened. He and his father were of a height and Fundin was better poised than most to read the runes that covered his head. They told of a father and a mother, one a warrior, the other a scribe, lost to war and dragonfire. It was a unique history and Dwalin would be damned if his father was going to learn about it. “I was looking for the...library.”

“Which one?” Fundin asked and he was _smiling_ which hurt. It honestly did, a stabbing pain right in Dwalin’s chest. It was rare, after the dragon came to see Fundin so unguarded. Dwalin had nearly forgotten what he looked like, with his long grey hair and beard. Both had gone white before the dragon came and after his head and beard were shorn in mourning and his bare scalp inked over with remembrances to the dead.

This wasn’t fair. It hurt too much. And he was going to tear the wizard limb from limb and leave his stinking corpse for carrion.

“There are about twelve, all told,” Fundin went on. “Lending library’s the closest, it’s practically outside - have you come for the conferences, though? Pity it’s me you found and not my wife, she could tell you anything you wanted to know, down to the page. I’m useless.”

“Useless?” Dwalin couldn’t help himself from speaking even as he cursed himself for a fool all the while. “Fundin the Fearless? Never.”

Fundin chuckled and rolled his eyes. There was something else about his father Dwalin always admired, he was the absolute soul of modesty. The biggest braggarts, Fundin once confided to his son, often turned out to be the least impressive on the field for they cared more about how they looked in action than how they fought.

 _Save your breath to cool your porridge,_ he said when he thought either of his sons acted too impressed with themselves. It was a lesson Dwalin himself tried to impart to Fíli and Kíli, but those two wouldn’t be told sometimes.

“Ah, well,” Fundin shrugged. “I serve my King. Different dwarves have different strengths, my wife’s is learning, mine’s warfare...and yours, I’d say.”

His eyes lingered on the notch orc steel had taken out of Dwalin’s face, the multiple lacerations on his arms. Dwalin had to resist the urge to tuck his arms behind his back. He’d never favored vambraces when he donned armor, he didn’t like anything hampering his wrists, to his father’s eternal frustration.

“Did you come as a guard to the caravans?” Fundin asked curiously. “Iron Hills? I don’t mean to pry, but I’m sure we’ve seen each other before, though I don’t remember the day. Shieldbrothers in the same battle, at least once?”

“Once,” Dwalin swallowed with difficulty. Once. And his father died and he himself became a legend. Never once in all his years had Dwalin found the trade to be a fair one. “You were the best of us. Sir.”

Fundin smiled again and waved off the compliments. “Now, now, none of that. Don’t let me keep you, which library was it you were interested in? My wife’s down there now - Halldóra, if you’ve heard tell of me, I’m sure you’ve heard of her - she’ll get you whatever it is you seek.”  
Dwalin asked for the largest of Erebor’s many libraries and Fundin very ably gave him directions back in the direction from which Dwalin had already come. Not listening to a word he said, Dwalin could only stare at his father as he spoke, the way his hair and beard were braided, the fine coat that covered his broad shoulders, belted over a hearty paunch.

“Got all that?” Fundin asked when he concluded and Dwalin hadn’t responded. The look of open friendliness was beginning to slip into one of concern. “Having a lie-down after a long trip wouldn’t go amiss either, you know.”

“I’m fine,” Dwalin growled gruffly, turning away from his father abruptly and resolutely not looking back. Like tearing cloth off a wound the blood stuck to, better to get it over with all at once. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” Fundin called after him. “What’re you called?”

But Dwalin rounded the corner and pretended he had not heard.

* * *

Only when the Company finally bedded down for the night did Dwalin leave Thorin’s side. In the encroaching dark, after they made a midnight meal of the sausages Bombur packed, Dwalin stuck closest to Balin once again. The two shared one bedroll and as the torches were doused, they got the assurance from their host that everything would be as it was in the morning.

All was quiet as the dwarves settled in to sleep. For approximately two minutes. Then the muttering started up.

"But _Ba-_ lin I can't sleep without - "

"Hush! Just close your eyes and pretend."

"I _can't."_

"You must. Come along, lay by me and close your eyes, you'll be asleep before - "

"Everything alright?" Thorin was standing over them and Balin drew back nervously - wee Thorin or not, he cut a rather imposing figure and he always looked so stern - but his voice was gentle and his concern seemed genuine.

"It's nothing," Balin was quick to reassure him, even as Dwalin balled his fists in his brother's shirtfront and hid his face in Balin's chest. "He's got a stuffed bear he takes to bed with him, he doesn't think he'll sleep without it - he _will_ , he just hasn't tried."

“It’s all wrong. Ama needs to tell me a story and kiss me goodnight,” Dwalin replied crossly, turning away from his brother suddenly. Rather than reaching for Thorin as he had been wont to do,he instead balled up the pillow he’d been given to sleep on and hugged it to his chest. “I want Porridge.”

“Porridge?” Kíli repeated, lifting his head from the floor to tilt it at Dwalin in confusion. “It’s a while yet ‘til breakfast, Mister Dwalin.”

“No, no,” the dwarfling corrected. “Not breakfast, _Porridge._ That’s my bear.”

From across the courtyard, Bofur let out a moan flailed his arms in the air briefly. He seemed resigned to the fact that this littlest version of Dwalin was exactly who he claimed to be, but that didn’t mean he was _used_ to him. “O’course he’s got a bear called Porridge. _‘Course_ he does!”

“Hush you,” Bombur poked him in the side. “You had an owl called Nutmeg.”

Thorin ran a hand through his hand and cast his gaze around, seemingly expecting a stuffed bear to manifest out of the night sky and come to his aid. Little surprise when it did not, but after the day he’d had, Thorin was willing to believe that anything was possible. “I’m afraid - ” he began, but stopped when Dís elbowed her way in front of him, shrugging out of her coat.

“Not quite who you want,” she acknowledged, holding the garment out to Dwalin, “but it’s warm and furry. D’you think this’ll help you pretend?”

Dwalin managed a small smile and got out from under the blanket he was sharing with his brother. “Aye, a little.”

“Well, a little’s better than naught at all, eh?” Dís grinned and wrapped the dwarfling up in her coat, from top to toe and then some. She patted the top of Dwalin’s head and winked at Balin when the older child signed ‘Thank you’ at her while Dwalin’s back was turned. “Goodnight, you two. Sweet dreams.”

“You too missus, thank you,” Dwalin replied, snuggling back down to sleep. Untucking one arm from Dís’s coat, Dwalin beckoned Thorin to come a bit closer. “You’ve got a good sister,” he informed him.

Thorin smiled at Dís who curled up between Kíli and Fíli, claiming she wanted the warmth because she’d given her coat away. “That I have,” he agreed.

“Go to sleep now,” Balin urged his brother. “You’ll keep everyone up.”

“Alright,” Dwalin agreed, closing his eyes. Thorin thought he was free to take his leave, but he stopped when Dwalin opened one sleepy eye and said, “G’night, Thorin, I love you. Even if you are old and grumpy, it doesn’t matter to me.”

A few paces away, situated between her sons, Thorin quite distinctly made out the sound of his sister _cooing._

“Love you too,” Thorin said, giving the back of Dwalin’s head a pat. “Go to sleep.”

For longer than was probably good for him, Thorin stared at the two brothers lying side by side on the ground. To be sure, he wanted his own Dwalin and Balin back. For all he’d reassured the child that missing his own friend was not the cause of his sorrow, Thorin _did_ miss Dwalin and Balin. A dozen times he wanted to turn to the older dwarf for some piece of knowledge and advice, but found a wide-eyed youngling in his place.

And yet...and yet to see them as once they were, young, innocent of so many of the world’s ills made Thorin want to keep them like that if he could, frozen in amber. But the road they had to tread was dark and full of dangers. No place for children. He still questioned the wisdom of allowing Ori and his nephews to come.

“Psst,” Fíli whispered and gestured toward Thorin’s abandon bedroll. “They won’t turn back if you stare at them, Uncle - though Mister Dwalin’s awfully sweet, isn’t he?”

Thorin nodded and trudged back to bed. “He is indeed.”

Fíli was quiet for a moment, then reached out and tentatively poked Thorin’s arm, “But - just for the record - I’m your favorite, right?”

Thorin smiled into the darkness and rolled over on his side, “Let’s just say that I love you too. Go to sleep.”

* * *

Dwalin and Balin found one another eventually, in a corridor only a few staircases away from their family’s quarters. They marched up to one another immediately, though neither was quite able to look the other in the eye at first.

“Didn’t manage to take my own advice,” Dwalin said after a long silence. “Didn’t have much choice, I ran into Da in the hall. Stupid, ought to have been mindful of where I was heading.”

Balin’s eyes went wide and he looked up at his brother in disbelief. “You didn’t. Tell me you didn’t, he must have recognized you.”

Dwalin shook his head. “Nah, not really. Thought I looked familiar, but nothing more. By the Maker, I sounded a fool, I scarce remember what I said to him. He looked so damned _young_ \- I don’t know how you did it, not approaching her, not saying anything - ”

“I did.”

“ - Why do you think I got out of there? I’d have opened my stupid mouth and - what?” Dwalin blinked at Balin. “What did you say?”

“Don’t call yourself stupid,” Balin said automatically, then ran a hand over his hair distractedly. “I did speak to her. Someone was giving her grief about book wheels - I don’t know what I was thinking, I said something and then we were talking...completely avoidable.”

“She didn’t recognize you?” Dwalin asked, finding that prospect difficult to believe. Hair and eye color aside, he always thought that Balin and their mother were hewn from the same rock.

Balin shook his head, “No, though, it’s as you said. She could’ve sworn we’d met before. I finally managed to get away by asking her to find a book for me. I left when she went to fetch it.”

“Which book?”

Balin managed a weak smile. “The prophecies of Durin III,” he replied.

Dwalin couldn’t help himself; he laughed, but it was a weak effort, quickly stifled. “Even if you hadn’t scarpered, she’d have wanted to get as far from you as possible,” he predicted, then leaned against a wall, shoulders slumping wearily as half a score dwarflings came running by, freshly released from lessons. He spied Dori and Heidrek amongst their number before he looked away.

“That wizard better hurry along,” Dwalin muttered to the air above Balin’s head. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take.

* * *

“Is this quite safe?” Balin asked Lord Elrond, one arm firmly around Dwalin’s shoulders as his brother cocked his head at the Elvenlord’s preparations, half apprehensive, half fascinated.

“Safe…” the Elf tested the word on his tongue and then smiled at Balin. “As safe as such things can be, young master.”

Balin’s grip tightened on his little brother and he scowled deeply. He did not like any of this, but safe or not, anything that would take them firmly back home he would count a blessing. There were things that these other dwarves were hiding from them, he knew that sure as breathing, but he was positive he did not want to know what they hid behind their meaningful glances, their abruptly halted conversations and veiled words that they’d exchanged all around him.

Whatever secret they harbored, Balin knew enough to assume it was terrible. And he’d had quite enough of misfortune to last him until the end of his days. He just wanted to be back home in Erebor with his family and friends where the world made sense.

Thorin was hovering nearby, looking alternatively grave and anxious. “They’ll be alright,” he demanded - not asked, _demanded_ \- of the wizard.

Gandalf’s nod was quicker coming than Lord Elrond’s. “They will indeed,” he nodded solemnly. “You may want to stand back - ah, not you two,” he motioned for Balin and Dwalin to come forward. “Stay right there.”

“It’s happening now?” Balin asked, looking a little green around the gills himself. “Do we have to do anything?”

“Will it hurt?” Dwalin asked, then quickly said, “I don’t mind, I broke my arm two winters ago and I didn’t even cry. I just want to be prepared.”

“All will be well,” Gandalf assured them with a smile. “Just remain where you are, your course will be clear to you in due - ”

“Wait!” Dwalin exclaimed, breaking away from Balin and running up to Thorin. He held his arms outstretched and Thorin picked him up, then was nearly strangled by the fervency of Dwalin’s embrace around his neck.

“Thanks for looking after us,” the dwarfling said, giving Thorin a smacking kiss on the cheek. “And thanks to your nephews and your sister and everyone. And tell the giant me that I said he needs to look after you better so you’re not so sad all the time. And remind him that you like ham and chocolates and oranges, in case he forgot, so he can get them and you’ll be happy again.”

“Let him go, he’s turning blue,” Balin said firmly, as he reached up to unwind Dwalin’s arms from around their cousin’s neck. Dwalin allowed himself to be placed beside his brother by Thorin who gave him as happy a smile as he could muster. Balin returned it, keeping Dwalin firmly in his grasp this time. “Thank you, sincerely. And whatever this journey of yours truly is, I wish you luck in it.”

“Thank you,” Thorin replied, then nodded toward Lord Elrond and Gandalf who stood patiently by. “Go on; home’s waiting for you.”

It was the work of a moment, but a very long moment. At first, nothing seemed to happen. Then the world seemed to shiver as the light and sun of Imladris gave way to the torchlit golden corridors of a world miles and years away.  
Dwalin’s face lit up as the image became clearer and clearer, so solid one could reach out and feel the smooth marble all around, but he had eyes for only one thing among the grandeur.

“Ama!” he shouted, tearing off toward the golden light. With one hand clamped firmly around the hood of his brother’s tunic, Balin ran off behind him, sparing the daylight and his strange traveling companions not a second glance.

* * *

Fundin saw his wife coming down one of the staircases that led to the hall outside the royal apartments and jogged to meet her before she was all the way down the stairs. Halldóra smiled broadly when she heard the sound of heavy footfalls and waved at her husband, leaning down over the railing to kiss him.

“It’s been the strangest day,” she said when she pulled away. “Do you know, I think the folk from the Iron Hills - ”

“Get stranger and stranger every time they come here?” her husband finished for her with a sly grin.

Dóra laughed and nodded, “Aye, just so! Why, have you been waylaid by an odd one too?”

“I certainly was,” Fundin nodded, waiting by the staircase as his wife joined him on the landing. “Tall, he was, inked all over. A warrior, I think, I’m _sure_ I’ve seen him somewhere, but I can’t place the face and he didn’t give me anything to call him by. Bit distracted, but I assumed he was road-addled.”

“Same with mine!” Halldóra declared. “Not so tall, white hair and beard, but he wasn’t old. His hair was shorn, I assumed he’d lost a spouse, but I didn’t ask. Bonny blue eyes, I noticed those straight off, you know I’ve got a weakness there.”

“Your weakness worked out in my favor,” Fundin winked. “What was the trouble with yours?”

Dóra made a vague gesture of general confusion. “As you said, distracted. Road-weary, I shouldn’t wonder, but then he asked me to fetch him a book - Durin III’s _Prophecies,_ that ought to have tipped me off that I was dealing with a queer one. I got it as quickly as I could, but he was gone again when I returned! I hope he took himself to bed, he looked like he needed it, poor dear…”

She trailed off and stopped in the middle of the hall, looking behind her. “Where are the lads? I thought you were fetching them after lessons.”

“Was I?” Fundin asked, trying to remember what they had arranged that day. “Balin has a free afternoon, I think. I thought he was going to fetch Dwalin and bring him home, keep him busy ‘til we got back.”

Dóra snapped her fingers and nodded, “That was it! I can’t keep anyone’s schedules in my mind, it’s such a muddle. Anyhow, Balin ought to get a little treat for minding his brother, don’t you think? Perhaps an outing will do, just the three of us, to Dale, you know how much he - aha! _There_ you are!”

Dwalin ran right into his mother, ramming his head into her stomach and wrapping his arms around her waist. Balin was right behind him and, seeing his mother’s arms were full, turned to his father instead, enacting the exact same pose that Dwalin had taken up.

Fundin was never unhappy to receive a hug from either of his children, but it was unlike Balin to be so excessively demonstrative in so public a place these days. Something to do with acting grown-up, he supposed, so it was with a little reluctance that Fundin pulled away and tilted his eldest boy’s chin up.

“Here now, what’s all this?” he asked. Balin opened his mouth, but closed it, blinking and looking a little muddled.

“Oof!” Halldóra exclaimed, trying to get Dwalin to raise his head and look at her properly. “Don’t bowl me over, now, sweetling - ” A sudden sniffle made her raise her head and look at her husband in alarm.

“What is it?” she asked, bending down to take Dwalin’s face in her hands and kiss both his cheeks. “Did you have a bad day at school?”

“What’s wrong?” Fundin asked Balin again, putting a hand to the boy’s forehead. “Aren’t you feeling alright?”

“Fine,” Balin replied a little vaguely. He frowned and shook his head slightly, as if trying to set his thoughts in order. “I thought...there was something I wanted to tell you, something important...but I’ve forgotten.”

“Well that’s alright,” his mother said, looking between Balin and Dwalin. Dwalin was wiping his face on his sleeve and seemed annoyed to discover that he had been crying for no apparent reason. “I’m sure you’ll remember later, if it’s so important. Over supper? Do you want to go down to the dining hall, you’ll probably feel better once you’ve had something to eat.”

“Aye,” Balin agreed, pulling away from his father only slightly. “That’s probably it, I can’t remember what I had for midday meal.”

“Neither can I,” Dwalin echoed, then looked up at his mother and inquired brightly, “Does that mean I can have two desserts?”

“Let’s get you something a little more wholesome,” Halldóra laughed, pleased to see her son’s little fit of sorrow had worn itself out; Dwalin really was a very happy child, in general, it was odd to see him out of temper. “Then we’ll see about second desserts. You’re not as big as your father yet, you know.”

* * *

_“There_ you are!”

They both turned at once. How could they not? Their mother was calling them.

No, not _them_ the brothers realized as dark corridors became a sunlit courtyard. Not _them_ as two dwarflings came running full speed past them, into waiting arms. Not them at all.

Yet there were arms waiting for them too when the world stopped shifting and Dwalin and Balin found themselves blinking and dazed in bright sunlight. Thorin and Dís surrounded Dwalin as Fíli and Kíli ran forward and hugged Balin, one on each side.

“You’re back!” the lads chorused as one.

“You were _such a grump_ , Mister Balin!” Fíli informed him. “I used to wondering that you and Mister Glóin were kin, but I see it now!”

Dís lifted herself up on her toes to kiss Dwalin’s cheek and whispered, “You might have to crack a few orc skulls to restore your reputation.”

“Oh, no,” Dwalin groaned. “How bad?”

 _“Well,”_ Dís began slyly, eyes sparkling with mischief, “we heard tell of a particular friend of yours by the name of Porridge - ”

“To be fair, that wasn’t my doing,” Dwalin told her. “He was Balin’s before he was mine.”

“Either way, I don’t think Bofur’s quite recovered,” she laughed, pulling away to stop her sons tormenting Balin. “Thorin can tell you the rest.”

Dwalin looked at his friend and king expectantly, but Thorin only shrugged. “I don’t see as you were that different,” he said. “A bit shorter, but the same in essentials.”

Dwalin raised an eyebrow. “Essentials?”

“Aye,” Thorin confirmed, punching him hard on the shoulder with the deepest affection. “In all the ways that matter, you’re the most steadfast dwarf I know. How did...how was it for you?”

They were both very aware of all the things Thorin was carefully not saying. All the things he was giving Dwalin permission not to say. Dwalin saw his out and he took it. With a small shake of his head and a last longing glance to the place where he had been and could never go again, he replied, “There’s nothing much to say. It’s gone.”


	17. Decorations (Bombur&Catla, parent-child bonding)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences. **Warnings:** Mentions of violence and death, but nothing graphic.

There were very few things Bombur had saved of his parents’ possessions, but the box of apples was one of them. He had only been a lad when the orc raid upon their village left half the Mannish houses in flames and five-score dead Dwarves in its wake, few of their possessions survived unbroken and in those first few awful years after Bifur’s injury more little particulars had to go to pay for healers or to make the rent when their cousin was out of work and he himself was too young to pick up the slack.

The little wooden crate, stuffed with straw, that held six glass apples, red as red could be, remained through all of it. 

They’d not been made by either if his parents, both Mam and Da worked in the mines, it had been two generations at least since their folk could afford being apprenticed to glassblowers. Da hadn’t even liked them all that much, he rolled his eyes every year when Mam got them out of their crate and lined them up on the windowsill. 

“You know the only reason they’ve come to us is ‘cos no one else in your family had a use for ‘em?” Balur would say with fond exasperation. 

“No matter,” Catla would answer sweetly, positioning them in such a way that the winter’s morning light coming into the kitchen would shine on them. “I reckon they’re pretty, so there you are. No one’s making you look at ‘em.”

“True enough,” Balur would nod, coming up behind his wife to give her a squeeze. “There’s sweeter apples yet to be found in this house.”

He would kiss her cheeks and she would giggle and their sons would groan. That was the way of it every year around Mahalmerag, until the awful winter when the only red they saw out their window was the blood of the slain.

But Bombur didn’t think about that when he uncovered the apples and made to place them upon his own windowsill. Unlike his mother he hadn't a hope of getting it done in the morning. Mornings were far too hectic with five children to dress and get sent out into the world while feeding them and making sure he didn’t forget his boots as he ran out the door, hastily kissing Thyra when they passed in the streets and performed their daily hand-off of the children. 

After he came home from work and started supper bubbling over the stove, he fetched the crate out from its customary place in an old trunk in the room he shared with his wife and the youngest two. The wee ones were enjoying an evening nap, so really, the lateness of the hour was optimal; fewer little hands would reach out and break the things before he managed to set them out. 

“What’re you doin’, Da?” Catla asked, jumping on her father’s broad back so she could peer over his shoulder. Her common name was chosen to honor his mother, but as the years passed, it became obvious that the two were nothing alike in temperament. Honestly, if Bombur had to choose a dwarf his daughter seemed to emulate the most, he would have to settle on Dís. Or Dwalin. 

Bombur had been expecting the assault and managed not to shake the crate around too much. “Bit o’sprucing up,” he told her, holding one of the apples up for her too see, but just out of her reach so she could not touch. 

Catla tried touching them anyway. She reached out and the tips of her fingers barely ghosted along the shiny, cool surface. “Are they...glass?” she guessed, squinting at them. “They don’t feel like wax.”

“Got it in one,” Bombur smiled approvingly. “There’s me clever lassie.”

“Did Uncle Bifur make ‘em?” she asked, sliding off her father’s back so that she could kneel beside him and peer into the box. “What’re they for?”

“Uncle Bifur didn’t have a hand in these - they’re older’n he is.”

Cat’s eyes went dinner-plate wide as she gaped. _“Really?”_ she squeaked, disbelieving. “Older’n _you?”_

“Well, as Uncle Bifur’s older than me, aye, that too,” Bombur replied, only a _little_ miffed that his eldest girl thought that he and his cousin (who was going grey in the beard) were of an age. “Don’t rightly know how old they are, they was old when me own parents was young.”

Catla whistled, loud and clear, threw her teeth, just as her Uncle Bofur taught her too. Bombur grimaced and looked over his shoulder toward the bedroom; he was sure that being possessed of a loud whistle was a useful skill that would benefit the lass someday, but for now all it did was rouse younger siblings from naps. “But what’re they for? Just to look at? Do they do aught?”

“Well, Bombur said, getting to his feet to place the first of the apples upon the windowsill. Cat and Bilfur were old enough to remember not to touch them, Lúfi could probably keep his hands to himself if he was given frequent reminders and the littlest ones were too small to reach the sill without help, so he thought they were probably safe. “They’re ornaments, lass, all they’re meant to do is be a bonny sight. You know apples don’t grow in wintertime, it’s heartening to see ‘em ripe and ready for eating, glass or no. They’re meant to get strung up and hung from trees, as Men do come Yuletide.”

“Oh,” Cat replied knowingly, standing up and rocking back on her heels as she looked from the apple on the windowsill to the ones still in the crate. A scant second later she was kneeling by the box again, reaching out with a tentative finger to stroke the smooth red glass. “Da?”

“Aye, Cat? Careful there, gently, don’t you be prodding at them, now.”

“Aye, I’m being gentle. But if they’re s’pose t’be used up by Men, how come we got ‘em?” she asked, turning one of the little apples right side up, fingering the tiny hole in the stem meant to hold a hook. “Why don’t to take ‘em to market and sell ‘em off?”

“Too dear for most what live round here and too fine for them as could afford ‘em,” her father told her, bending down to pick up a second apple and lay it by its fellow. “So here they sit for us to use in the way we see fit - for looking at, aye, but not _touching.”_

“If they’re meant to be hung, why don’t we hang ‘em?” Catla asked, snatching her hands away and lacing them together behind her back. “We could stick more hooks in the plaster an’ cover ‘em up again once it’s springtime - or keep ‘em and hang new things, wouldn’t that be nice, Da?”

Bombur stopped to consider the idea. If they were strung high enough, that would alleviate his worry over the younger members of the brood getting curious and making mischief with them. The days being so cold, there was little need to open and shut the window and they were far enough from the door that they’d not be disturbed by gusts of wind that came from folks coming and going.

“I reckon that’s a grand idea,” he replied and Catla beamed, clapping her hands in glee. 

“I’ll get the hammer!” she shouted, but Bombur crossed to her in three quick strides and grabbed the back of her tunic in one hand.

 _“I’ll_ get the hammer,” he informed her and smiled at her pout. “You sit here and keep guard - I don’t want no one laying a hand on these apples, eh? Keep your brothers well away.”

The pout vanished, replaced by a broad grin and an eager nod. “Aye, sir! You can count on me!”

Bombur certainly could. Cat was a very...enthusiastic dwarfling and when he returned only a minute later with the hammer and six hooks, he found his daughter sitting upon Bilfur and Lúfi whose faces and protests were muffled in the hearth rug. The apples, to her credit, remained untouched.

“I done just what you said, Da!” she announced proudly. “And kept the sticky-fingers where I could sees ‘em.”

“Let ‘em now, please,” Bombur ordered. The second he was free, Bili was up like a shot, claiming that his little sister tried to kill him and that he should get her supper for the crime. Lúfi remained lying on the floor, looking apprehensively between his father and elder sister, not sure whether he was in trouble or Cat was. 

“I had a duty,” she maintained stubbornly. “And I did it.”

“There’s such a thing as going too far,” Bombur observed, picking the entire crate up off the floor and balancing it on the windowsill so that he could make an effective barrier between his curious children and the heirlooms. 

Seeing that justice was not going to be served, Bilfur forgot his quest to obtain his sister’s evening meal and instead asked his father what he was doing. When Bombur told him, Bilfur’s eyes lit up and he asked, “Can we help?”

Bombur hesitated a moment, considering. He’d never once been allowed to help his mother set the apples out, it was her task to put them on the sill and his not to touch them until the holiday was over. But he was already breaking tradition in hanging them…

“Go on and find me a length o’string, a long one,” Bombur told them. “And if you’ll promise t’have a care, aye, you can help.”

The children scattered, searching the rooms (careful to tip-toe past their littlest brother and sister) before they returned triumphant with a roll of twine, sporting identical proud smiles. Bombur strung the apples himself, not quite trusting delicate work to little hands, but he lifted each of the children up so that they could each hang two apples from the newly embedded hooks. 

“What d’you think?” he asked as they stood back and admired their handiwork. The children had no chance to answer for their mother came home just then, stomping the snow off her boots and the three ran to greet her. 

“It’s a fair blizzard outside!” Thyra announced. “I’m putting more coal on that fire, the night’s bound t’be a cold one - oh my, that’s as cheery a sight as I ever did see.”

“We done it, Ma!” Bilfur informed her, puffing his chest out. 

“It were _my_ idea,” Cat elbowed Bili out of the way, just so there could be no mistaking who the mastermind of the plot was.

“Da helped!” Lúfi piped up, raising his arms in hopes he’d get picked up.

“Did he, now?” Thyra asked her second son, lifting up on to her hip and kissing his nose. “Weren’t that good of him?”

Bombur smiled and shrugged, “I just do what I’m told ‘round here.”

Thyra came up close and kissed him, smiling at the pretty ornaments in the window. “Your Ma’s?” she asked, nodding at the display.

Bombur nodded and slipped an arm around her waist. “Aye. And her Ma’s and _her_ Ma’s - well, it’s a bit different this year.”

“I like it,” Thyra said. “I’m sure she would’ve approved - or elsewise been put out she’d not thought of it herself.”

The door of their bedroom opened then and Alfur toddled out, rubbing his eyes sleepily, his hair sticking straight up from his head. “Supper, Da?” he asked, then gasped when he saw the apples in the window. “Oooh, le’me see! Le’me see!”

“I’ll get the baby,” Thyra said, putting Lúfi back on the ground. Bombur picked Alfur up in the doorway and walked him over to join his brothers and sister, still admiring their handiwork. Alfur tried to reach out and pick one, but Bombur stayed his hand.

“They’re just for looking,” Cat said warningly. “They’re older’n the mountains, Al.”

“Not quite that,” Bombur said, passing a hand over his daughter’s head. “They do look a lovely sight though. Well done, lass. Your grandmother would’ve liked it, I think. Very much.”


	18. Ice Skating (Dís/Víli, angst)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** PG **Warnings:** Allusions to and grief because of spousal death.

No one was sure anymore whether or not strapping blades to the bottom of one’s boots for swift transportation over frozen rivers and lakes was a notion decided upon by Men or Dwarves. The popular notion was the Men invented the practice of ice skating and Dwarves perfected the blades, sturdy enough to support a stout dwarrow and sharp enough to make for a smooth glide along the glassy surface of a well-frozen body of water. The activity was originally intended for ease of travel and transport of goods, but someone long ago, possibly a clever child of either race, decided that practicality could give way to fun.

Dís was grateful to them, whoever they were, for the idea. The apartment she shared with her brother and sons wasn’t large enough or interesting enough to entertain two mischievous dwarflings all the long Western winter. Thorin them had fashioned skates for both boys and tied them firmly to their boots that morning, having conspired with Bofur who offered to do the teaching for him.

Dís sat on a log nearby, warming her hands with a cup of hot cider that Thyra set to boiling in a small cauldron over an open flame. It was her task to keep the fire going and mind baby Alfur, swaddled in thick wool and tucked cozily into the crook of her arm while his parents took the eldest three onto the ice for a lesson. 

Neither Thorin nor Bofur, she noted, were particularly good teachers. Their lessons seem to consist entirely of letting Fíli and Kíli cling to their hands while they dragged them around the ice. Dís declined her brother’s offer to make a set of blades for her own use; she would be no better than her sons at the exercise, she was quite sure.

Víli had been shocked - _shocked_ \- to discover that she’d never learned to skate.

_“No money nor spare steel to waste on blades,”_ she told him when he asked if she wanted to go down to the pond with him her first winter in the Ered Luin. _“I’ll watch, though.”_

When he hadn’t moved, she made a little shooing motion and went to get her coat, but he caught her wrist with the biggest smile on his face. _“I’ve found something I can do that you can’t!”_ he shouted gleefully. _“At last!”_

When she pointed out that he could play an instrument and she couldn’t do anything except whistle, Víli shook his head and tweaked her nose. _“Music’s music, lassie!”_ Then he seized her hand and ran out the door with her dragging behind him. _“C’mon! It’s me only chance to impress you!”_

Truly, there were many qualities Víli possessed that were impressive. His ice skating abilities weren’t even in the top ten, but she liked to watch, though she always declined participating. She hadn’t even known Thorin knew how to skate until she caught Dwalin teasing him about it. 

_“The river never froze over in wintertime, but there were a few ponds that got a good ice on them,”_ Thorin said. _“I’m sure we took you out a time or two, don’t you remember?”_

_“Oh, right,”_ Dís said vaguely, turning away from her brother as she spoke. _“A time or two.”_

But, of course, she did not remember. Not at all. 

_“No matter,”_ Víli said late one winter evening, laying on the hearth rug watching Fíli pull himself along on his tummy toward his stuffed wolf pup that Thorin had given him when he was first born. _“First winter he can walk, I’ll take him out - and you too, lass. Give you both a lesson, it’ll be grand.”_  


_“Fine,”_ Dís agreed, snuggling up next to her husband on the floor. _“If you promise to hold my hand and not just set me on the ice and give me a push, I’ll take you up on it.”_

_“‘Course, I will,”_ Víli smiled. _“I’ll stay by you all the while, as long as you need.”_

It was a chance he never had, a promise that would never be fulfilled. 

“Come on, Mam!” Fíli shouted and waved as he and Bofur passed her by. “Have a go!” 

“Nah!” Dís called as she waved back with the fingers not grasping the handle of her mug. “I’m happy to watch - careful now, don’t fall!” 

“Got him!” Bofur assured her cheerfully, raising Fíli’s arm to show she hadn’t let go. The action caused him to lose his balance and both of them, teacher and pupil, fell on their bottoms. 

“But whose got you?” Dís laughed, but the sound felt hollow and she shifted little Alfur in her arms, holding him closer to her chest. “It’s getting chilly for the wee nipper, eh? I’m going to take him inside to thaw.” 

Alfur was only a baby, after all. Too small to stay out of doors in such weather. And too young to notice when she started to cry halfway back to the apartment. 


	19. Feast (Thrór/Sigdís, marriage proposal)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** PG-13 **Warnings:** For **language** , Dísa has a dirty mouth. Also for shades of **gender essentialism** with regards to childbearing/rearing, when we're talking royal succession and bloodlines, things tend to skew that way, but I tried not to make it too heteronormative. And while we're at it there's minor angst over **asexuality** , though that's really the norm for dwarves.

It was somewhere around the tenth toast to Thrór’s name, reign, and prosperity that Dísa realized he was missing. 

The coronation - the proper one, with all the due pomp in the throne room, not hastily performed on a battlefield still glistening with the blood of the slain - had gone off without a hitch. She stood by in the shining red armor of the King’s Guard while Thrór looked a proper monarch, the very picture of regality in his court robes, new bear fur and of course, the crown upon his head of gold and onyx. 

No one would have guessed that he spent the night before playing knucklebones with Fundin when memorizing the ceremonial responses grew too tedious. He hadn’t even returned to his own rooms, but fell asleep with his head on Dísa’s lap while she tested his responses for accuracy. Not very kingly, perhaps, but he spent most of his nights falling asleep on the sofa in her family’s quarters; since Grór fucked off to the Iron Hills, he said the royal suite had grown too empty. 

The little bastard had been gone for a two months and claimed that the roads were too wet and muddy this time of year to travel back to see his elder brother crowned King Under the Mountain. Dísa merely nodded silently when Thrór informed her of the fact, folding his letter into smaller and smaller squares before he tucked it away in his pocket.

She wanted to say that such an absence showed sense; if Grór had come she would have swept him clear off his feet and shaken him so hard his teeth rattled out of his head, but she refrained. Thrór was under enough strain already and her threatening bodily harm to his youngest brother would only make him feel worse. Youngest brother. Only brother, though she thought him unworthy of the title. 

“Frór’s...you know how close they were,” Thrór spoke around a growing lump in his throat, wiping tears out of his eyes before they could fall, so many months ago after Grór announced his intention of abandoning Erebor to live as a ward of his great-uncle farther East. “He’s taken it hard.”

 _And you haven’t?_ Dísa wanted to demand, but did not. That night she bit her tongue so hard to stay her words that she tasted blood. 

She knew grief, she understood grief, she herself had wept and mourned as much as any would when her own parents had died, but she had not abandoned her kin. That was the act of an ingrate and a coward, she was neither and Grór, as far as she was concerned, proved himself the lowest, vilest sort of treacherous wretch fifteen years before reaching his majority. 

They waited until autumn to hold the coronation. Thrór agreed, give the people a good party during a time of renewal, turning over. A new year and a new king. Very neat.

Only Thrór was nowhere to be seen, not teasing his ministers and advisors, joking with the warriors, or flirting with the serving maids as was his wont at festive celebrations. Dísa slipped away, unnoticed among the general revelry. She’d not had nearly enough to drink to ignore Thrór’s absence and even if she was blind drunk, she had to admit that she would always feel a little off-balance, enjoying herself when he was not.

She found him in a dark chamber off the main hall, sitting on a dusty staircase that led up to, she believed, a storage room for the extra flatware. His robes were abandoned beside him, along with his chains off office and the crown was nowhere to be seen. At first, she almost passed him by, thinking he was a youngling who’d imbibed too much, too quickly, but his shoulders were shaking with sobs, not heaving with illness.

Steeling herself, Dísa walked over to her dearest friend and king, biting her lip and staring down at the top of his head. His long black hair was falling over his face in sheets, his head buried in his arms which were folded on top of his knees. 

“Budge up,” she said, unable to think of anything else; she’d never been very good at offering comfort. 

Thrór did not look up, only shifted slightly to the left, sliding his robes against the stone, collecting dust. Dísa sat down beside him, arms balanced on her knees, hands hanging toward the floor.

“How’s it going in there?” Thrór asked thickly, his words muffled in his arms. “Everyone having a good time?”

“Mmm-hmm,” she confirmed, cocking her head toward the raucous shouts that indicated general merriment. “They’ll be talking about it for years, won’t be long before they break into your amad’s stores of Elvish wine.”

Thrór let out a sound that might have been a choked sob or an aborted laugh.

“Good,” he managed. “Drink it all, I say. Then when morning comes round, they’ll forget the whole thing.”

That was a sort of plan, she supposed. Get the entire kingdom so drunk they didn’t remember their own Names, let alone who was king. Then steal out in the middle of the night, grab a pair of horses from the stables and _go_. Maybe try their luck as sellswords. Become the sort of vagabonds that children always clamored to hear tales of, aiding lost travelers, stealing from dragons.

Or not. Dísa fingered the ink markings on her jaw, still slightly raised and tender if she pressed too hard. They’d both had their fill of dragons and they could never leave; neither of them was Grór, after all.”

“Sounds good,” she replied quietly. “Only the people will be wanting their king.”

“Oh, aye. Their king. To rule and make decisions and know a thing or two about _law_ , I barely scraped by in school, and that’s to say nothing about trade and funds and the damned treasury and the armies and...and...S’hands, Dísa,” he raised his head at last and looked up at her with red-rimmed eyes, still awash in tears. “What am I going to _do?”_

His head hit her shoulder before she’d quite turned to face him, but lucky for them both, Dísa was quick on the uptake. She crushed Thrór in a close embrace and his nervous fingers desperately clawed at her back, leaving marks of tears and sweat where his palms touched her tunic. These crying fits were new, usually brought on when he was under pressure enough to crack a diamond. She didn’t think there was any weakness in them, but she had no idea how to make him feel better. 

This was what he’d been born for. Duty, if not Fate. It was something they’d never considered, except in the abstract.

_When I’m King, I’ll get second servings of supper before you!_

_When I’m King, you’ll have to pretend I’ve outmatched you for swordplay - at least once a year!_

_When I’m King, you’ll have to stop thieving my pipeweed when you’ve run out!_

Thrór always made such pronouncements with a cocky grin and a wink. Now here he was, King Under the Mountain. And she’d never seen him more miserable.

“It could always be worse,” she said, cringing at how unhelpful the words were. She was ill-suited for this task, ill-suited for mending broken hearts, but everyone she knew who might help was dead. Aside from her, Thrór really didn’t have anyone else left. “‘Least everyone likes you,” 

“Oh, aye,” Thrór snorted without mirth. “Everyone likes me. They all think I’m an _idiot_ , but they like me.” 

“You’re not an idiot,” Dísa retorted immediately. “You’re _kind_. S’not your fault we’re surrounded by daft grumps who can’t tell the difference.”

“We won’t be much longer,” Thrór muttered, dragging the sleeves of his fine silk tunic over his eyes. “Eyes look further East. Judging. Assessing. They think the throne Grór stands to inherit looks more attractive by _far_ than the one I’m sure to bring to ruin.”

The time for warm embraces had past, Dísa decided firmly. She pulled back and took Thrór by his shoulders and gave him a rough shake, “Then they don’t deserve you. Let them go hang themselves in the Iron Hills. You’ve slain a _dragon!_ Half the dwarves who give study to the portents say it’s a good omen!”

“And the other half say a crown forged in dragon fire falls in ash,” Thrór retorted, pulling away from her slightly, then raised his hand and traced the new lines upon her face. “Don’t talk it up like that - _you_ slayed a dragon. I claimed its head as a prize, let’s not forget who was given its golden coat as a boon.”

“It was the Mountain’s triumph,” she insisted, waving the words away as if they were smoke rings. There hadn’t been any fire, it was a cold drake, after all. It was true that the gold embedded in the worm’s soft belly was in the King’s treasure house, though the bounty belonged to Dísa by custom and the King’s indulgence. She accepted it, of course, she simply didn’t have anywhere to put it. “And _you_ are the face and voice and heart of the Mountain. So it’s yours as well.”

Thrór heaved an enormous sigh, leaning his head back until it touched the stone rail to his right. When next he spoke, it was with his eyes closed.

“That’s all past, anyway, it’s the future I’m worried about,” he groaned, his voice very low. “Mark me, by this time next year, half the Mountain will have buggered off to the Iron Hills. They see stability there and I don’t blame them. Who knows who the throne will go to, I haven’t any...I don’t _want…”_

“Don’t tell me you don’t want children,” Dísa said warningly. “That’s a lie, I know you too well.”

“Very well, I won’t say it,” Thrór opened his eyes, but kept his gaze fixed on the torch burning over her head. “But I don’t want a - a consort. I haven’t - that sort of thing, I...and there’s _no one_ who would...it’s different among the common folk, if I were a simple smith, it would all be different, but I’m not and if I pledge myself to some poor sod who must resign themself to a cold bed for the sake of the continuity of my line...oh, I couldn’t.”

The tenor of the conversation made Dísa extremely uncomfortable, but if anyone asked her why she shifted on the stones beside Thrór she would swear that it was only because the chill of the stairwell was working its way up her backside. Customs varied amongst the kingdoms, but an heir of blood was always desired when securing a throne. If they could ever hope to retake Khazad-dúm one day, the lineage of they who would reclaim it had to be spotless. A true heir of Father Durin, nothing less. 

“You could find someone,” she said uneasily. “Someone who wouldn’t mind. Surely there’s - ”

 _“I_ would mind,” Thrór said, locking eyes with her, distraught. “How would I even go about it? Put up a notice listing the terms and conditions? 'Wanted: One bearing dwarf who can content themselves with fervent embraces and little else, most of the time.' Even if I was going to marry, I’d want to marry someone I love and there’s no one I - I - I _can’t._ And a king who can’t ensure the continuity of his line is a king whose failed before he’s set out.” 

They sat together for a long time after that, not speaking, not touching, letting the sounds of merriment wash over their ears. 

Dísa’s stomach was rolling as if she’d had a great deal of grog and stood up to fast, but she hadn’t drunk all that much and she wasn’t moving at all. The blood was pounding in her ears and sweat was pooling at the small of her back. She recognized her body’s reactions for what they were: fear. But what had she to be afraid of? She’d killed a dragon, after all. She wasn’t afraid of anything.

“Would it be easier for you?” she asked, turning her head so that she could look Thrór straight in the eye. “If we were married?”

His face crumpled and he looked away, shaking his head. “Don’t be - I _know_ you don’t want - you’ve got the Guard, it’s all you - ”

“Fuck the Guard,” she said succinctly, seizing his wrist in case he got it in his head to walk away. “I’ve had the Guard for more than twenty years. Leave me out of it, what I do and don’t want and answer my question: Would it be easier for you?”

Thrór’s broad hand lay on top of Dísa’s larger one, but he made no motion to throw her off, nor did she ask her to let him go. “You know it would,” he breathed, “you _know_ it would, but Dísa I _love_ you and I would _never_ ask you - ”

“You haven’t asked,” she said at once. “I’m offering.”

Sigdís, daughter of Farin, Huntress of Erebor, called Dragonslayer in these latter days, took a breath. 

She had faced down starving and desperate wolves in the forest, taken on scar after scar doing battle with Orcs and Goblins and all their foul allies. Armed with a steel arrow and her longbow she drove the poisoned head into the heart of the beast and come within inches of his maw, full of teeth as long as her arm and as sharp as a spike as the beast writhed in its death throes.

Dísa exhaled and performed the single bravest act of her life asking, “Would you marry me?”

Thrór shuddered and reached for her blindly, closing his eyes once more. Their foreheads met and he pressed against her, arms clutching her shoulders. 

“Dísa, _Dísa,”_ he breathed. “You’re too noble. Are there no lengths to which you would not go to serve your King?”

“This has naught to do with serving my King,” she replied, eyes open. Dísa seized Thrór’s face with both hands and kissed his mouth hard, closed lips pressed against closed lips. “It’s all to do with _you._ You know I’m loyal to you over and above the throne of Erebor.”

Thrór’s mouth twitched in an ironic half smiled and he chanced to open his eyes again. “You just said they were one and the same. I would never want to make you give anything up, if we had - if there was a child, you’d not ride with the King’s Guard again - ”

“If you think you can _make_ me do anything, the rumors are true and you are an idiot,” she said, a smile briefly lighting her face before it was gone. “I’m one warrior among many. If I sharpen my axes and plant my shield in defense of home rather than the world abroad, so be it. There’s no dishonor in that.”

“But would you be _happy?”_ Thrór asked desperately. 

Dísa did not need to think before she made her reply, “I cannot be happy when you’re miserable. I took a vow to your father, I made the same one to you. If I’d die upon the blade in defense of you, why should I not live beside you. This way...I could be with you, always.”

“Not always,” he pointed out quietly. “When the war drums sound?”

“I’ll send Fundin in my stead,” she replied. “He’s good with axe and shield - _very_ good, he’ll get better as he grows and he will march to war with the old songs of steel and blood in his heart. And I’ll be here, keeping Erebor safe for you. I’ll promise you that if you promise me that you will come back.”

Thrór took up both her tattooed, calloused hands and kissed them, every finger. “You know neither of us can make such promises,” he said sadly.

She squeezed his hands tight and looked at him with fire in her eyes, “We can do anything. Anything we want, you and I. Together, we can move mountains. And that’s all I’m asking - will you live out this life, my life, your reign with me? Together, in this world and the world to come?”

Hands still clasped, Thrór seemed moved beyond speech as he once again lay his head against his dearest friend’s, his gaze never wavering from her face. Silently he nodded. 

“I’m yours,” he said roughly when he found his voice again. “I’ve always been yours. Aye, together. In this world and the world to come.”


	20. Pudding (Catla&Tauriel, gratitude)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None, other than minor DoS spoilers - I changed the origin of one of the little plot points to fit in with _Wild Geese._
> 
> Post-BoFA, but EVERYBODY LIVES. EVERYBODY. And it is sunshine and rainbows under that freaking mountain. Ahem. Just to be clear. The romantic intention behind the fic is Kíli/Catla, but if you want to imagine a Kíli/Catla/Tauriel threesome in the immediate future, you are welcome to do so ;-)

“Mistress Elf! Mistress Elf!”

Tauriel paused in her path, glancing over her shoulder down at the figure barreling up the corridor toward her. It was a dwarf, but not one of the fourteen who initially came to reclaim Erebor; this one must have been newly arrived from the West. Rosy-cheeked and round-faced, the dwarf had leaf-green eyes and fluffy hair the color of new wheat braided on her - yes, _her_ Tauriel decided, the figure was decidedly womanly, though stout and broad - cheeks. 

There had been caravans coming to the mountain steadily for nearly two weeks now. It seemed when news of the Dwarves’ victory over the dragon and subsequent alliance with Men and Elves against the armies of Orcs and Wargs that their kinfolk in the Ered Luin packed up their lives and made the long journey East, not sparing a thought for wintry weather and bad roads. What did they care if they spent all their coin ensuring safe travel? There was gold enough for all of them to rebuild their lives once they arrived.

Tauriel had seen precious few of these new arrivals for most headed straight to the interior of the rock where custom dictated, even now, that no Elf eyes would ever look, nor feet tread. She respected the wishes of King Thorin that the old customs stand; despite their peace, despite having fought on the same side in battle for the first time in centuries the divisions between their races ran too deep to ever be bridged permanently. Even now she had concerns that this unity between them would not stand the test of time, not time as understood by Elvenkind.

But she would endeavor to enjoy it as long as it lasted. So she came to the mountain when she could, helped with what rebuilding she was permitted to aid with (not much, all told) and tended to those still recovering from their battle wounds. Dwarves might not mark much from the passing of the seasons, but spring was in the air and summer short to follow; in Tauriel’s heart that meant an abatement of the darkness, at least for a little while.

The young dwarrowdam skidded to a halt, a heavy covered crock in her arms. 

“You move so fast on them long legs o’yours, I nearly lost you!” she announced with an awkward respectful gesture that was less than a bow, but more than an inclination of the head. “You _are_ Tauriel, are you not? Captain of the Elvenking’s Guard.”

“I am,” she replied, crouching down to spare the girl’s neck. “I do not believe we have been introduced, if we have, I’m sorry, but I don’t recall your name.”

“I’m called Catla,” she replied. “Catla Bomburul, of Clan Broadbeam, a stonemason by trade and we haven’t met. Just arrived with me Ma and me brothers and sisters, reckon we about doubled the number o’dwarves living ‘neath this rock. We _have_ got a friend in common, though. I heard you pulled Kíli’s fat out o’the fire more times than’s worth counting.” 

“Ah, you’re the stone girl,” she said, remembering a long ago conversation that she’d had with Kíli when the dwarves of Erebor had been her prisoners and not her allies, strangers and not...well, not friends exactly. Comrades, perhaps.

Dwarves, in general, seemed strange even now. To her confusion, the dwarrow maid seemed tickled pink by the descriptor. 

“Really?” she asked, in a would-be-casual kind of way. “He...he said that, did he? Well. Isn’t that...something. He said stone-girl? Exactly that?”

“Not as such,” Tauriel replied carefully. Rather than falling, the girl’s face took on an expression of extreme concentration and she made a motion for Tauriel to go on speaking. “You gave him a talisman, did you not? A runestone.”

“Talisman?” Catla replied, bewildered. “No, I never - oh! _Oh!_ He’s cheeky and you mustn’t pause in striking him when he gets in a stupid mood, elsewise you only encourage him. Aye, I gave him a runestone, but there’s nothing of magic about it. It’s a game, y’see. Toss the stone in the air and think of a question. Whichever way it lands, there’s your answer. I carved it for him, he gets restless, fidgety and his Ma can’t be expected to keep him in line _all_ the time, can she? Not when they’re on the road and there’s work to be done.”

Tauriel could not help smiling at the girl, little wonder that she and Kíli were friends, they both seemed to be equally fond of chatter. 

“I thought he might have been exaggerating,” she replied, lowering her voice and speaking to Catla with an air of secrecy. “He said there was a curse on it.”

“Oh, that part was true,” Cat leaned forward, eyes sparkling. “I told _him_ if he got himself killed on this quest that I’d reach ‘tween worlds, pull him back to me, beat him to a bloody pulp and then let the Maker have him back again.” 

Tauriel laughed softly; the threats of violence, meant, she learned, affectionately were something she had to acclimate herself to over the past months. She thought Master Óin the strangest healer she had ever encountered for he constantly threatened to do injury to those he nursed if they did not heed his commands. Kíli and Fíli both had both been promised multiple breaks to their still-healing bodies and Dís told her, with a roll of her eyes, that Óin looked Thorin himself dead in the eye and threatened his king with dismemberment, since he was so eager to have his limbs out of bed. 

“I am happy to have been of service,” Tauriel said, though her smile lost some of its luster as she recalled the scars upon Kíli’s face, still so red and raw, though the bandages were long since removed. “Though I regret that he did not escape from the battle wholly unscathed.”

“Oh, what?” Catla asked, tossing her head carelessly. “That wee little scratch? If you ask me, he’s handsomer for it, I never liked that eye anyway, he’s better off with the other by itself.”

Unsure whether the girl was joking or not, Tauriel only looked at her, unsure of what to say. Fortunately, Catla had words enough for both of them. 

“But enough about Kíli, his ears are burning, to be sure.” The dwarrow lass lifted the tureen she was holding out for Tauriel to take. “This is for you - mind, me cookery’s not so grand as me Ma or Da’s, but I think it came out alright. S’hard to tell, had to go on a merry chase to find all what I needed - the rum came from the depths, must be positively ancient, but I don’t _think_ it goes off.”

Tauriel reached out to take the tureen, but pulled her hand back at once with a low hiss; it was still burning hot, though the girl held it in her arms without a care in the world. 

“Oh! I’m sorry, I’m _so_ sorry, soft hands, eh?” Catla shifted the crockery to hold it under one arm while with her other hand she tore the woolen lining out of her coat. “No matter, these togs’re on their way out - little wonder after walking half the continent eh? There you are, go on, just don’t touch the pot, now.” 

More carefully this time, Tauriel took hold of the tureen and lifted the lid. Inside was a brownish lumpen thing with traces of black where it had singed around the edges. The smell it did not quite make Tauriel’s eyes water, but she did blink several times; the rum had lost none of its potency for time. 

“It’s plum pudding,” Catla supplied helpfully, clasping her hands before her and twiddling her thumbs anxiously. “Brought the spices all the way from the Blue Mountains, but I had to be a bit scanty doling ‘em out. I’d have carved you something, but I don’t know as you’d have use for it and anyway, me family usually gives food as thank-yous. And I _do_ want to thank you for looking after him so well. For saving him all them times what you did. I...I’m awfully fond of him, no matter if he’s careless eedjit.”

Unsure of what the appropriate dwarven etiquette was for being given a questionably edible gift in return for saving the life of a prince of the realm, Tauriel did the only thing she could think to do. She smiled at the girl and said, “You’re very welcome. I think the world would have been a poorer place to lose him.”

“Aye,” Catla smiled back with a small sigh. The look on her face was exasperated, but deeply affectionate and though Tauriel knew she would never truly understand the minds of Dwarves, it appeared that there were some constants within the hearts of all creatures. “You’re right in that.”


	21. Party (Dwalin&Frerin, Smaug's attack)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** This is set the day that Smaug attacked Erebor, featuring my headcanon of where Frerin and Dwalin were when it occurred. We all know what's going to happen, so maybe skip this one if you don't want to be reminded.

“I can’t see anything! Can’t I ride in front?” Frerin rammed his head into Dwalin’s back between his shoulderblades.

They’d been riding for all of a half an hour and Frerin had done nothing but complain and wiggle in the saddle - which was precisely why he was riding with Dwalin to begin with. The whole thing felt like an exercise in futility, Frerin was never going to become a hunter if he couldn’t learn to keep his mouth shut. As it was, they stood to catch exactly nothing if Frerin couldn’t hold his tongue.

Not that this outing was meant to feed the Mountain, it was a learning experience for Dwalin and Frerin both. They had set out with Master Skade a white-haired dwarrowdam older than Frerin’s grandmother who still boasted keen eyes and fine ears despite her years. Along with them were younglings ranging from seventy-four to forty-five. Dwalin was one of the eldest and Frerin the youngest; despite the fact that they had been given a horse to share, it was not for Dwalin to presume to teach Frerin anything, he was little more than a childminder.

 _“Stop_ it,” Dwalin hissed when Frerin pinched the flesh under his arm. The muscles in his hands twitched, but he stopped himself from elbowing his younger cousin in the ribs. He’d only fall off his pony and crack his head on some rock and then Dwalin himself would be the one to take the blame for the incident, no matter what part Frerin himself played.

Sometimes he wished he had a younger brother or sister. When the desire threatened to send him into whinging and melancholy he only had to spend an hour or two in Frerin’s company before the longing wore itself out. 

“Be _still,”_ Dwalin muttered when Frerin shifted for the upteenth time behind him. “I mean it, Frerin, if we have to stop because you’re being a pain in the arse, I’ll shave your head.”

“My _head?”_ Frerin squeaked, going blessedly still for a moment. “You wouldn’t!”

“I wouldn’t have much choice in the matter; you haven’t enough on your face to bother - ach! Look what you’ve gone and done!”

Skade stopped her pony. When she turned the creature around, she surveyed the dwarflings behind her with a grave expression. “Do you hear that?” she asked.

“Sorry, ma’am, we’ll be quiet,” Frerin piped up, leaning over to stick his head out from behind Dwalin and favor the huntress with an apologetic grin.

Skade shook her head. “No, no. _Listen._ What do you hear?”

All of the dwarflings tried to listen, but before long they were shooting one another mystified glances, some signing their confusion to one another in furtive iglishmek, asking one another what they thought the right answer was. 

Heidrek, never one to keep his thoughts to himself, replied first, “I don’t hear anything, ma’am.” 

The grin he wore when he spoke was slightly apologetic, slightly careless. Dwalin rather wished Frerin had been left in the charge of this cousin from the _other_ side of his family, but he could see why he’d been given the task over Heidrek. Put the two of them on horseback together and there’d be no beasts for miles around, they’d be singing, larking about, the worst of the hunting party. 

Yet Skade was looking at Heidrek as though he’d said something profound. “Aye,” she nodded. “Nothing. Not even birdsong.”

They all felt it then, a rumbling in the soil. The ponies whineyed and pawed the ground. Dwalin’s mount stamped her hooves in the ground and rolled her eyes, but he was an able enough rider to calm her. Frerin’s arms went around his waist, where they ought to have been since they set out and he whispered, “What’s wrong?”

Skade’s eyes were fixed to the West, where the Mountain loomed on the horizon. She stared and stared and then they heard it - an awful sound, like nothing none of them had ever heard before. Part scream, part bellow, part roar. A sound that would haunt their nightmares for decades to come.

“Stay here!” Skade ordered them, kicking her pony’s sides and cantoring back to Erebor. “I’ll come back for you, if I can!”

 _“If?”_ Heidrek shouted. _“If?_ Master, what - ”

The sound came again, louder this time. Then they saw the fire in the sky.

 _No,_ Dwalin thought, eyes widening as the full horror of the situation came to him in a flash. _No. No, it can’t be. It can’t be. I’ve got to go home. I’m supposed to have dinner with Da and Ama. I promised. She promised. Auntie Dísa will kill it, she must, she’s done it before, please, please, oh, please let them be alright - Balin’s on guard duty, Thorin’s in there, everyone I care about - **Please, Maker of our Fathers and Mothers, have pity as once You did when Your children cowered before You, trembling...** _

“Dragon,” Frerin whispered, then shouted. “It’s a dragon! Dwalin, we can’t just stay - ”

But his cousin had already spurred his pony into a gallop, wishing he’d taken a real horse, they were swifter by far and he was tall enough to handle one with ease, but not Frerin. Driving his heels in, Dwalin urged the beast on faster and faster, toward the distant screams and smell of smoke.

“Hold on!” he shouted to Frerin. “Just hold on!”

The younger dwarfling gripped Dwalin’s waist tightly and buried his face in his cousin’s back. Eyes on the Mountain, Dwalin kept one hand on the reins and reached down to grip one of Frerin’s hands tightly. 

“Just hold on,” he repeated more quietly. _And pray._


	22. Presents (Fundinson Family, Dóra's Name Day)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None, plain old family fluff.
> 
> The title of the opera that gets referenced in this fic comes from the musical _1776_ and the song that's quoted is "You and I" from _Meet Me in St. Louis._ And the riddles Haldr references are the Riddle of the Sphinx from Greek Mythology, the Riddles of the Caskets from Shakespeare's _The Merchant of Venice_ and Samson's Riddle of the Bees and Honey from the Bible. Also the book that Haldr gives Dóra is meant to be some dwarf version of _One Thousand and One Arabian Nights_.

The sight of a blank piece of parchment covered in neat, quick-drying lines of ink never failed to fill Balin with a certain thrill, as though he was doing something wrong, defiling the paper with his script. Probably had something to do with the innumerable times he’d been scolded and occasionally swatted by his mother for sneaking into her study and marking up her own papers and books with what, at the time, seemed to him improving pictures and nonsense letters. It just seemed such a shame that so very much of the parchment was blank, unused, tempting little dwarrow fingers to smear them with ink.

At the moment, he was not doing anything illict - save for the fact that his inkpot was slightly closer to the book than dictated by the library’s standards of behavior, but a day that passed without causing his uncle to suffer a minor attack of apoplexy was not a day truly lived.

Balin had a short bout of the condition himself when a sooty hand imposed itself in his field of vision and snapped its fingers to get his attention.

He looked up. And up. And _up_ (really, this was getting unreasonable) into Dwalin’s equally smudged face.

“I’ve been standing here for five minutes,” his younger brother complained.

“Poor thing,” Balin dead panned, pushing the chair across from him out with the toe of his boot. Dwalin made to sit down, but Balin bade him wait and pulled another roll of foolscap out from the pile upon the table and handed it to him. “Put that down first or Uncle Haldr’ll have your ears.”

Dwalin snorted, but did as he was told, covering the seat of the chair so his sweaty, dirty clothes would not stain the upholstery.

“Uncle Haldr doesn’t care about the chairs,” he said dismissively, but his manner turned conspiratorial as he scooted forward. The legs scraped against the bare stone, earning him not a few _Shhh_ es from the surrounding tables. Dwalin deliberately dragged the chair even closer, raising a dreadful racket, until his chest was flush up against the table and Balin kicked him. 

“What is it you want? Apart from making a mess and causing trouble?” he asked impatiently, though he supposed he ought to be used to these interruptions. No sooner did he get five minutes to himself than someone came barging in on him with some problem or other, as though he was King Under the Mountain holding court. He couldn’t begin to guess why that was, it was impossible someone might have mistaken him for Uncle Thrór. Aside from one or two strands that were quickly plucked or hidden in a braid, his hair had not begun to silver yet. 

“Ama’s Name Day’s coming up in a month,” Dwalin informed him, as if it was some great revelation or sought-after secret. 

Balin blinked. “I’m sorry to have underestimated you,” he said seriously. “You’ve come to make a mess, cause trouble, _and_ bring me news I already know. Quite an accomplishment after seven hours in the forge and a very profitable use of your free time, I’m sure.” 

This time, Dwalin kicked him. _“Ba-_ alin,” he groaned, forgetting to keep quiet and prompting another round of shushing. “Oh, go boil your heads,” he said crossly to the studious dwarves. 

Balin nearly stabbed him with his penknife. Nearly. In actuality, he only held it up threateningly, making a deliberate gesture toward Dwalin’s dirty hands. 

“Can’t you see I’m _busy?”_ he hissed, putting the knife down as Dwalin scowled at him. “I know perfectly well when our mother’s Name Day is, it’ll all be taken care of, a box of spiced chocolates and a pound of coffee from the shop in Dale she likes. As you haven’t any money - ah, don’t pull faces, you don’t have any earnings to speak of and every penny you get from Da and Ama is gone the next hour - I’ll pay. You’ll clean my blades for a week after - nay, better make it two weeks, the price of chocolate will have gone up this early in the year.” 

Dwalin’s scowl deepened and he kicked Balin’s boots again, softly, with the intention to annoy, not to injure. Their steel toecaps clanged nevertheless and with a loud huff one of the nearby dwarves gathered up his books and quills, presumably leaving for a quieter corner. Balin shot his brother a look, meant to communicate, _See what you’ve done?_ but Dwalin was unmoved. 

“I don’t want to do that this time, I want to do something different,” he said, leaning closer still, elbows leaving greasy smudges on the tabletop. “I was working on a set of ear cuffs today, they came out alright, Master Finnr said an armband should be easy _and_ I’m a quick study with carving - he said _quick_ study, word for word, I’m not making that up - ” 

“Of course you aren’t,” Balin interrupted, all sincerity now. “Why shouldn’t you be? But I don’t see what that has to do with Ama’s - ” 

“I want to make something for her,” he said, squirming a little with anxiety now that he’d spoken the words aloud. “Carve something. If I started now I’d have it done in plenty of time and it wouldn’t be rubbish, only I haven’t the funds for gold and you...well, I’ll still clean your blades if you want.” 

Balin paused, considering the notion. It wasn’t a bad idea, all told. More personal than chocolates and coffee which, truly, they might have given her any old time. 

“What sort of carving?” he asked curiously. “Lattice might be nice, a simple pattern and she could wear it with anything.” 

Another fidget. Dwalin looked away, trying to wipe at the stains he’d left on the tabletop and only smudging them more. “I wasn’t thinking lattice,” he mumbled. “I was...I was thinking a line or two from a song she liked. Mayhap.” 

“Oh,” Balin said, laying his quill aside at last and gifting Dwalin with his full attention. A line or two from a song. Their mother would love that sort of present, she’d find the thoughtfulness just as nice as the gift itself. There was no doubt it was the perfect gift, the only doubt lay in whether or not Dwalin could do it. 

There was little doubt in Balin’s mind about his brother’s aptitude for smithwork, he had always done well as an apprentice and received almost as much praise in the forge as he did upon the warriors’ practice grounds. Reading and writing, on the other hand, was not one of his brother’s strong suits. Truthfully, it was easier to recite to him and expect him to recall what was said rather than record something that had been written and the less said about his penmanship the better. 

Suddenly defiant, Dwalin looked up and glared at Balin with narrow eyes. 

“I’ve got a month!” he declared defensively. “And I wouldn’t set it straight into the gold, that would be daft. I’d practice first, on clay, something soft and worthless. I wouldn’t even _touch_ whatever you bought until I had it perfect, so don’t go saying it can’t be done.” 

“I haven’t,” Balin replied carefully, consciously working to keep any trace of doubt from his expression or his voice. “All I said was, ‘Oh.’” 

Could it be done? If Dwalin failed, it would mean Balin was out of spending money for a few weeks with nothing to show for it on their mother’s Name Day. Yet Dwalin would not have suggested it if he thought the task beyond him; his brother hated to fail at anything. 

“I think it’s a splendid notion,” Balin said, catching Dwalin’s eye so there was no way his brother could mistake his sincerity. “Truly. I’ll purchase the materials, you do the work, I have every faith in you.” 

This time it was Dwalin’s turn to be surprised and he echoed, uncomfortably, “Oh. Er. Good. Thanks.” 

“Well, well, well,” an irritated voice piped up from just over their heads. “Naturally you _would_ be the cause of the cacophony. What toll must I pay you little bridge trolls before you go on your way and cease being a public nuisance?” 

Evidently, on his way to a more peaceful corner of the library, the dwarf who had been so bothered by their noise-making was not so very busy that he did not have time to complain to their uncle about them. Being head librarian - being Uncle _Haldr_ , really - it was no surprise he would forego all pleasantries before greeting them. Still, the ‘little’ part of his insult was hardly justified; they’d both been taller than him for years. 

“We’re discussing our mother’s Name Day present, that’s all,” Balin said, glancing down at his notes, dry, but only half-finished. “I thought this was a library, not a crypt.” 

Haldr swatted him on the nose with a rolled up quire of parchment. “No back-talk,” he chided. “Why are you lads worrying yourself about that? Her Name Day’s not for...oh. Oh, it is coming up soon, isn’t it? Well, _shite._ And you!” 

This time Balin and Dwalin both suffered a bop on the nose each with the roll of parchment as their uncle went on, twice as loud as they’d been, “You might’ve told me before now! How long were you planning on waiting before bringing this to my attention, until the day was gone and passed and I truly looked an arse?” 

“That was the plan,” Dwalin nodded cheekily. 

“Hands where I can see them,” Haldr ordered, raising the parchment threateningly again. When Dwalin complied he tutted and said, “Keep them up - don’t touch _anything_ \- ” 

“I’ll be gone at once if you do me - do _us_ a favor,” Dwalin requested, smiling in a way that would have charmed their mother instantly, but had little impact on their uncle. “Answer a question?” 

“Well?” Haldr asked, raising an eyebrow. “What’s the riddle, gatekeeper? Let’s have it, and get thee gone, I don’t want to see hide nor hair of you ‘til you’ve had a thorough scrub. Come, come, out with it. I know all the answers: Honey from the lion’s belly. Give and hazard all he hath - the lead casket, of course. And if you ask me what walks on four legs in the morning, two come afternoon and three by nightfall, I’ll strike you and call you a half-wit because that’s _insulting.”_

Dwalin grinned and Balin rolled his eyes; Uncle Haldr always had a flair for the melodramatic, despite his repeated protestations that he was the only dwarf under the mountain with any sense. Dwalin thought he was funny, but Balin thought he could occasionally become tedious, especially when he had a receptive audience. 

“What’s Ama’s favorite song?” Dwalin asked and Haldr gave him another swipe with the parchment, less well aimed this time and easily dodged. 

“All of them,” he replied immediately, then held up a hand. “Wait! That’s not my true answer, it’s no reason to deny me safe passage nor devour me whole, if that’s your aim.” 

“It’s not a riddle and neither of us is a sphinx,” Balin informed him, trying mightily to keep the impatience from its voice. “For her Name Day, the two of us were going to go in on a piece of jewelry, we wanted to get it engraved with a song she was fond of.” 

Haldr stared at them for so long Dwalin wiggled in his seat and Balin began to feel distinctly uncomfortable. 

“That is…” Haldr said slowly and they prepared for a lengthy diatribe about their respective levels of idiocy. “...brilliant. So brilliant I wonder I hadn’t come up with it myself and I’m of half a mind to knock you both out with a candelabra and steal your notion as my own. Familial affection has stayed my hand, but that is _brilliant._ Who knew you had it in you?” 

“It was Dwalin’s idea,” Balin informed him hastily, wanting to give credit where credit was due. 

Haldr went to clap a hand on his shoulder, but thought better of it and instead nodded at him in an approving way. “Well done,” he said. “Well done indeed...now. Songs. Let’s see...don’t move. Give me ten - no, five minutes. Count me down, I’ll be right back.” 

At precisely four and a half minutes, Haldr returned bearing a thick libretto in hand which he dropped on the table between them. 

“There you are,” he announced. _"As I Ever Was and Ever Shall Be,_ the most saccharine piece of theatre to come out of the East in three hundred years. Pay special mind to “You and I,” its been her favorite song for the past century and a half. She had a stuffed hare she used to lisp it to, it was humiliating to witness.” 

Both lads grinned at each other, almost as pleased to have a new embarassing insight into their mother’s childhood as they were to have the libretto. Balin opened it as Uncle Haldr walked away with a strict warning that Dwalin not so much as _point_ at the book, lest he destroy the thing. 

“What’d you reckon?” Dwalin asked, leaning over the book as Balin leafed through the pages. “Nothing too long - ” 

“I can’t _afford_ anything too long,” Balin assured him, looking up beneath his brows and giving Dwalin a wry smile. “Anyway, I know just the one, she sings it all the time… _there.”_

He copied the words down in a sure hand, making the characters large, thick and regular, more like patterns for carving than script. Dwalin was frowning at him and wrinkling his nose. 

"If you're having second thoughts..." Balin began, but Dwalin shook his head. 

"Not about the present," he replied, frowning at the paper. "The words. Aren't they a wee bit..." 

"Sentimental?" 

"I was going to say treacly, but sentimental does just as well," Dwalin nodded. "Are you sure about that one?" 

Balin nodded confidently, "Aye, it's perfect, trust me. Ama is fond of sweets, after all." 

* * *

It had been a very fine Name Day as such things went. Once court was concluded for the day Thrór gifted his favorite scribe with a necklace made of emeralds that alternated on the chain with polished pieces of blue-green sea glass. It was a unique piece, but, as ever the real prize for another five years of faithful service to her liege-lord was a new cushion for her scribe’s perch she sat on to record the doings of the courts. That present was always much appreciated and earned Thrór a hug and a kiss for his troubles. 

Thráin and Freya’s gift was one of parchment, ink and new pens. Freya apologized and said she thought they ought to have gotten something a bit more interesting, while Thráin insisted that she could _use_ them, so what was the trouble? Halldóra put an end to the argument by informing them that she was always happy to have new materials to work with - even if, as she acknowledged with an ironic smile at Freya, it was a wee bit predictable. But when had Thráin ever gone in for surprises? 

Haldr tracked her down on the way back to her room after supper and thrust a parcel into her arms, then hurried away, claiming he had an appointment to keep. Halldóra had to chase him down the corridor and pounce on him to express her thanks. It was a beautifully illuminated copy of _The Thousand Stories_ , the gilt and silver shining off the pages. Despite his protestations that his nephews settled on a superior present, Haldr certainly had not done badly in his choosing at all. 

Neither Balin nor Dwalin knew exactly what their father had gotten her. They shared an orange spice cake, but the two were sure that Fundin must have gifted their mother something else - and since she hadn’t opened it in front of them, they were both very sure they did not want to know what it was. 

“Alright,” Halldóra turned to her sons expectantly when they’d finished off the cake. “Where are my chocolates? I’ve been waiting very patiently all day.” 

Balin and Dwalin exchanged a glance, both trying to hide smiles. 

“We didn’t get you any, Ama,” Dwalin informed her, biting his lip to keep from laughing. 

Balin shook his head sadly, “It was an utter failure in the execution of our duty, for we didn’t get you any coffee either.” 

Halldóra was too wise and knew her sons too well to be taken in by their little spot of playacting, but she folded her arms and humored them, “Really? Well, that’s a pity.” 

She managed to hold her disapproving posture for about five seconds and would have gone longer had her husband not grown impatient with their foolishness and asked, “Well, what _did_ you get her, then?” 

Halldóra dropped her arms and tutted at him, “Come along, spoilsport, let them have their fun.” 

“It was rotten joke,” Fundin maintained over his sons’ dual protests that it was _actually_ very funny for they were both laughing. “Acting as if you wouldn’t get your mother a present. Come along now, no more secrets, it’s getting late.” 

As Balin bent to retrieve the wrapped object secreted away in his coat, Halldóra rolled her eyes fondly at Fundin and patted his knee, whispering again, _“Spoilsport.”_

Dwalin was sitting closer to his mother on the sofa than Balin was, so it was his task to give it to her, “From both of us,” he explained as Halldóra unwrapped the golden bracelet. 

Her mouth dropped open in surprise and she looked at the two of them, astonished. “Oh, you lads didn’t have to get me anything so...chocolates and coffee do me quite well - my, my…” 

Halldóra’s lips moved silently as she read the engraving that wound its way twice around the band. _From my heart, a song of love, beseeching. Just for you, my longing arms are reaching._

Eyes filling with tears, Halldóra rose from the sofa to embrace each of her sons. “Oh!” she exclaimed kissing Balin first, then Dwalin. “You’re so sweet, the pair of you. Going to the trouble to have it engraved.” 

Balin grinned smugly as he said, “Well, we didn’t. Have it engraved, obviously it _is_ engaged, but Dwalin did all the work, I just supplied the gold." 

The tears spilled over. For an instant, Halldóra just stared at her youngest son with a hand over her mouth, utterly overcome. It was a rare, rare thing for Halldóra to run out of words, but on her Name Day in the one-hundred and eighty-fifth year of her life, her sons managed it. No one knew better than she how much Dwalin struggled with letter-learning and the fact that he put such time and effort into crafting such a beautiful gift for his mother meant more to her than all the gold in the world. 

“Oh,” she managed when she found her voice again. Halldóra embraced Dwalin with all the excited enthusiasm she bestowed on her elder brother earlier in the evening, whispering, “Oh, thank you, sweetling, you make me _so_ proud.” 

Dwalin’s grin threatened to split his face, but he had dignity enough to color a little even as he squeezed his mother and muttered, “Glad you like it.” 

“Let me see,” Fundin asked, rising from his chair, just as delighted as his wife, though slightly less inclined to launch himself at his children. Halldóra pulled away from Dwalin to hand the bracelet to her husband. 

“That’s the last chance you’ll have to hold it,” she informed him, eyes still glittering with happy tears. “I’m never taking it off, it’s my favorite piece, my most beautiful piece and you…oh, I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, I’m the luckiest mother under the earth to have two such sons as you.” 

Balin was the second to suffer one of his mother’s heartfelt embraces and he returned the hug with a small, content smile. Beside him, Fundin gave Dwalin a squeeze around the shoulders and nodded approvingly. “Fine work, laddie, very fine.” 

“It ought to be,” Balin offered slyly. “Since I was the one who lay coin down on it.” 

His mother took his face in both her hands and kissed his nose loudly, “A worthier investment was never made, dearest.” 

Extending her right wrist expectantly, Halldóra waited as Fundin carefully fastened the bracelet over her sleeve. “Perfect,” she nodded, unable to stop smiling. “A perfect present.” 


	23. Snowball Fight (Fun times in Ered Luin, drabble)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None, it's just a happy little story with no plot.

No one expected it to be Ori. 

Of all the dwarflings in the Ered Luin it was Kíli who was said to have the best aim, Catla who had the best arm, Fíli who was the sneakiest, and Bilfur who was the best at weaseling his way out of trouble once he was caught mischief-making. After the first good snowfall of the year, the dwarflings collectively decided that when their parents came to collect them after a hard day’s work, they would hide and then surprise them with snowballs. They stockpiled them, making little mounds of snow, ready to fill their mittened hands with them once their first round was thrown.

Exuberance made for a very poor attack, they were laughing too much to be of use. Aim was taken, shots were fired, and snowballs exploded on boots, against shop walls or simply sank themselves in snowdrifts.

All save one lucky little piece of wet snow that got Thorin directly between the eyes.

Ori stood in the center of the roadway, his left arm still raised after having thrown the projectile, mouth slack with shock. 

Dori arrived on the scene just in time to witness his youngest brother physically assault his king with a fistful of ice and snow. He had no delusions that Thorin would call the act ‘treason’ - though he was fairly certain that assaulting the person of the king was probably illegal - but it was a tense few seconds that passed before Fíli popped up from behind a barrel and cried, “Well done, Ori! You got him!”

Thorin wiped the mess off his face and revealed a grin. 

“Well thrown, Master Ori,” he inclined his head toward Ori who smiled back, a little uncertainly. Thorin bent down and gathered a handful of snow into his gloved hands and added casually, “But I would find cover, if I were you.”

Ori didn’t need to be told twice. He made a mad dash for Kíli who caught hold of his hand and dragged him behind a rock. Fíli, bolder, threw a snowball at his uncle which missed, but got his mother right in the ear.

“Oh, you’re going to pay for that!” Dís exclaimed, charging right at her son. Fíli let out a piercing scream of pretended terror and ran away from her - right into Dwalin who caught him around the waist and held the wiggling, squealing dwarfling as if he was feather-light.

“Into the pond with him?” he inquired at Dís who shook her head.

“Too good for the likes of him!” she declared, then shoved a handful of snow down the neck of Fíli’s tunic. 

Cat and Bili lead Bofur, Bombur and Catla a merry chase around the hill, snow and ice flying every which way. The only one who stood apart from the fray was Dori, dry and warm in his coat and gloves - until an errant snowball from Thorin, aimed at his sister, hit him in the back of the head.

Dori turned slowly, eyes narrowed and asked, _“Really?”_

Thorin raised his hands in an innocent gesture, “There’s a reason I never became an archer.”

Sighing heavily, Dori bent down and gathered up a large handful of snow. 

“I so hoped it wouldn’t come to this,” he shook his head regretfully and lobbed the snowball at Thorin’s retreating back, then found himself well in the battle.

It was impossible to declare a victor when all was said and done, the dwarflings and their grown counterparts seemed to switch loyalties at random, using their friends and family members as shields one minute, then rushing to their defense the next. All were equally soaked through and cold when all was said and done as night fell in earnest upon the Ered Luin. 

In the descending twilight, the sad sorry lot of them trudged through snow and slush to Dís and Thorin’s where the promise of hot cider and a warm fire beckoned all, even Dori who supposed he could put off beginning supper, just long enough for Ori to thaw out.


	24. Morning (Thorin&Dís, gift-giving)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** Parental worries, but this is intended to be cute and fluffy, so nothing too major.

The celebration of Fíli’s Name Day, though a time of much joy and merry-making, did not excuse a dwarf from performing an honest day’s work on the morning that followed. Víli was up before the sun, whistling cheerfully as he dressed and made his way out the door (it seemed he had done nothing but whistle since his son was born and though Thorin appreciated the cheer, he would have prefered quieter rejoicing).

His brother-in-law had been in fine form the night before, entertaining their guests, beaming proudly as Fíli was handed around and made much of. The baby himself slept for most of the night, but all agreed that he was the bonniest, the handsomest, the sweetest dear they’d ever seen. Dís was tireless, accepting gifts and compliments with all the graciousness in the world whilst making sure the punch bowl never went empty.

Thorin had very little to do other than find a place for everything, which suited him perfectly well. Fíli, it had been decided months ago, would be his heir, but he was not the lad’s father in fact, only in law. Fíli’s Name Day was a time for his parents to be congratulated on their gift from the Maker, for Fíli to be welcomed not only into their family, but into the community.

Had they been in Erebor he would have been given blankets and clothing of the softest spun wool, his parents would have been given gems and gold and silver to adorn his hair and clothing when he grew older. Gifts for the child, the parents, the Mountain would have poured in from all over and there would have been feasting for days. 

Instead the sitting room was strewn with little wooden blocks, marbles and other toys to be saved for later. Cloths for mopping up messes, a patchwork quilt, and knitted clothes were neatly piled on the kitchen table. An abundance of food was wrapped and placed in the larder for later; that had been the most appreciated, by far, though it was the most perishable. The grandest gift by far was a little gilt hair clasp from Balin and Dwalin, wrapped in cloth that Dís had placed in her own clothes press so it wouldn’t get lost. 

Thorin’s own present to his nephew was still hidden away in his room. He was slightly embarrassed by it, it was nothing as grand as the tapestries, woven with threads of gold and copper, that his grandfather commissioned for himself and his siblings to warm the walls of their nursery. Yet he felt it was a necessary element of a young dwarf’s childhood and though they had little extra spending money, Thorin commissioned the piece to be made to his exact specifications. 

He took it up in his hands, intending to leave it by Dís’s bedside before he left for the forge, but he paused upon peeking into her room when he saw her scrubbing her face free of tears. 

Thorin was halfway in, she was sitting up in bed with Fíli in her arms - asleep, so Thorin wondered why she was not taking advantage of what sleep she could get. Dís was young - very young, but she’d stepped into motherhood with all the determination, skill and love that she applied to everything. She had been so cheerful over the last week and so calm that Thorin was startled to see that she seemed so very unhappy now.

“What’s wrong?” he asked. “Is Fíli - ”

“Fine,” she said without looking up at him. “Everything’s fine. Were you on your way out? Don’t forget to bring that knife set that wants etching, if you promise to c-cook supper, I promise to get them done tonight.”

His sister had not wept in front of him in over a decade, Thorin could see that she was fighting back tears, determined not to let them fall. But her distress was evident and he crossed to her, sitting down on the edge of the bed. 

“What’s wrong, my lass?” he asked softly, running a gentle hand over her hair.

“You’ll be late,” she replied, biting her lip and sniffling.

“Dwalin can light a forge fire on his own,” Thorin replied, unnecessarily for Dís knew that Dwalin was more than capable of minding the forge on his own. “What’s the matter? Did you have a...fight with Víli?”

“What?” she looked up at last, startled by his question. “No, of course not. He’s never had a cross word with anyone in the whole of his life, I just...I don’t know. I was feeding Fíli and he’s so...he’s just so perfect and I love him so much.”

“That’s...good, isn’t it?” Thorin asked tentatively. It never occurred to him that a child of his sister’s would be less than perfect or that she would not love them. Dís gave love more generously than he had ever done, he admired her for it. 

“It is. I just...I’m not...what if I do something wrong?” her face crumpled but she did not cry. In his mother’s arms, Fíli slept peacefully on. “I wouldn’t want to...Ama wasn’t always...and Adad didn’t...I just wouldn’t want him to think that I don’t love him. Not even for a moment.”

Thorin was at her side in an instant, pulling her into his arms, kissing the top of her head. He was not well-suited for giving or accepting comfort, but for his sister’s sake he would always try. 

“That’s not possible,” he said flatly. “You are not either of them - you are a better, brighter soul by far than the whole sorry lot of us.”

“That’s not true,” she shook her head and leaned against Thorin’s shoulder. “Don’t think so highly of me or meanly of yourself.”

“Well then, let me put it another way,” he said. “I’ve never doubted that you love me. And I’m…” 

He cast his mind about, trying to find something to say that would not have Dís scolding him for thinking meanly of himself. It was difficult, every time Thorin had cause to speak of himself he could think of few complimentary things to say.

“...a tough nut to crack,” he settled on finally. It was her husband’s preferred metaphor when he felt Thorin was being difficult. A wise choice, for talking about Víli never failed to make Dís smile.

And smile she did. “Well, you’re a tough nut and I love you,” she admitted, tilting her chin up to give Thorin a kiss on the cheek. The little present he abandoned on the edge of the bed caught her eye and she nodded to it. “Is that Fíli’s present? And here I thought all you were giving was your eternal love and devotion.”

“That too,” Thorin agreed. “But I thought he could use something a bit more tangible.”

Thorin’s present was a little stuffed wolf pup. Its fur was soft, its eyes were black buttons and it had four stout little legs to stand upon, but its crowning glory were the overlarge floppy ears atop its head. He had specifically requested that the ears not be too stiff and Bifur, true to the care he always put in his craft, had followed his specifications to the letter. 

All the melancholy still lingering in Dís’s face melted away as she looked at the creature. “Oh! Oh, how wonderful! Didn’t I have one like that when I was small?”

“You did,” Thorin nodded. “But it had been mine first and - ah, he awakens. What’s your judgment, then, Fíli?”

The baby blinked once, then twice. Thorin waved the little pup in front of his face and for an instant his eyes focused on it - before they closed and he promptly fell back asleep. 

“He loves it,” Dís declared. “I can tell - thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Thorin replied. He kissed Dís once more on the forehead and did the same for Fíli who continued enjoying his sleep. Morning was dawning in earnest by the time he finally stepped out the door, but he had a feeling that Dwalin would not be annoyed with his tardiness, not once he explained the cause.


	25. Family (The Company)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Rating:** General Audiences **Warnings:** None.
> 
> That's all for this year folks! I hope you all had happy holidays or just a happy December!

Thirteen dwarves were asked to finish the phrase ‘Family is...’ using one word. 

“Difficulty,” said with little hesitation. Then, “Wait! I mean...well, difficulty. But not as bad as all that. Well, sometimes as bad as all that. The word ‘difficult’ doesn’t necessarily indicate negativity, you know. Some difficult things are very worthwhile. Anyway, I’ve gone on too long, I’ll say ‘difficulty’ and leave it at that.”

“There. What? It’s as good a reply as any. And they are. There, through it all. Mine is, anyway, don’t know how yours measures up.”

There was a long, contemplative silence before the following response, “Important. Very, very important. I couldn’t make up my mind, but I think ‘important’ covers just about everything.”

“Could you repeat that? Family? Responsibility. More than you bargained for, but that’s life for you.”

“Responsibility - you’ve heard that one already?” Stout fingers stroked an impressive beard for a moment before answering, “Pride. That ought to have been my first answer, but there you are.”

Another responded with a rueful shaking of his head and a sound that was half a chuckle and half a sigh before saying, “Forgiveness, I think.”

“Honor. Or duty - no, honor. Duty doesn’t have much to do with it.”

“Fun!” was one enthusiastic reply, coupled with an infectious grin.

The next response was signed, _Love._

The third said, “Abundance,” with a slightly chagrined smile.

The following two were questioned at once, but had different answers (though their immediate response was a simultaneous exclamation of, “Mam!”):

“Support. Aye, that’s it.”

“I’d say ‘help,’ myself.”

“They’re the same thing.”

“No, they aren’t. Support’s what you need before you make up your mind to do something risky, help’s what you need when the thing’s been done and you get in over your head.”

“True enough - what about ‘guidance’?”

“Guidance works. Alright, support and guidance, I like that.”

“Me too.”

The thirteenth and final reply was so long in coming that the questioner was about to repeat themself for fear they hadn’t been heard. When voiced it was stated quietly, but sincerely. “Everything.”


End file.
